Kitabı oku: «Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood», sayfa 9

CHAPTER XXII
Vain Intercession

He had a small farm of his own at the foot of the hill of which he had the charge. It was a poor little place, with a very low thatched cottage for the dwelling. A sister kept house for him. When we approached it there was no one to be seen. We advanced to the door along a rough pavement of round stones, which parted the house from the dunghill. I peeped in at the little window as we passed. There, to my astonishment, I saw Jamie Duff, as I thought, looking very happy, and in the act of lifting a spoon to his mouth. A moment after, however, I concluded that I must have been mistaken, for, when Turkey lifted the latch and we walked in, there were the awful John and his long sister seated at the table, while poor Jamie was in a corner, with no basin in his hand, and a face that looked dismal and dreary enough. I fancied I caught a glimpse of Turkey laughing in his sleeve, and felt mildly indignant with him—for Elsie’s sake more, I confess, than for Jamie’s.

“Come in,” said Adam, rising; but, seeing who it was, he seated himself again, adding, “Oh, it’s you, Turkey!”—Everybody called him Turkey. “Come in and take a spoon.”

“No, thank you,” said Turkey; “I have had my supper. I only came to inquire after that young rascal there.”

“Ah! you see him! There he is!” said Adam, looking towards me with an awful expression in his dead brown eyes. “Starving. No home and no supper for him! He’ll have to sleep in the hay-loft with the rats and mice, and a stray cat or two.”

Jamie put his cuffs, the perennial handkerchief of our poor little brothers, to his eyes. His fate was full of horrors. But again I thought I saw Turkey laughing in his sleeve.

“His sister is very anxious about him, Mr. Adam,” he said. “Couldn’t you let him off this once?”

“On no account. I am here in trust, and I must do my duty. The duke gives the forest in charge to me. I have got to look after it.”

I could not help thinking what a poor thing it was for a forest. All I knew of forests was from story-books, and there they were full of ever such grand trees. Adam went on—

“And if wicked boys will break down the trees—”

“I only pulled the bilberries,” interposed Jamie, in a whine which went off in a howl.

“James Duff!” said Adam, with awful authority, “I saw you myself tumble over a young larch tree, not two feet high.”

“The worse for me!” sobbed Jamie.

“Tut! tut! Mr. Adam! the larch tree wasn’t a baby,” said Turkey. “Let Jamie go. He couldn’t help it, you see.”

“It was a baby, and it is a baby,” said Adam, with a solitary twinkle in the determined dead brown of his eyes. “And I’ll have no intercession here. Transgressors must be prosecuted, as the board says. And prosecuted he shall be. He sha’n’t get out of this before school-time to-morrow morning. He shall be late, too, and I hope the master will give it him well. We must make some examples, you see, Turkey. It’s no use your saying anything. I don’t say Jamie’s a worse boy than the rest, but he’s just as bad, else how did he come to be there tumbling over my babies? Answer me that, Master Bannerman.”

He turned and fixed his eyes upon me. There was question in his mouth, but neither question nor speculation in his eyes. I could not meet the awful changeless gaze. My eyes sank before his.

“Example, Master Bannerman, is everything. If you serve my trees as this young man has done—”

The idea of James Duff being a young man!

“—I’ll serve you the same as I serve him—and that’s no sweet service, I’ll warrant.”

As the keeper ended, he brought down his fist on the table with such a bang, that poor Jamie almost fell off the stool on which he sat in the corner.

“But let him off just this once,” pleaded Turkey, “and I’ll be surety for him that he’ll never do it again.”

“Oh, as to him, I’m not afraid of him,” returned the keeper; “but will you be surety for the fifty boys that’ll only make game of me if I don’t make an example of him? I’m in luck to have caught him. No, no, Turkey; it won’t do, my man. I’m sorry for his father and his mother, and his sister Elsie, for they’re all very good people; but I must make an example of him.”

At mention of his relatives Jamie burst into another suppressed howl.

“Well, you won’t be over hard upon him anyhow: will you now?” said Turkey.

“I won’t pull his skin quite over his ears,” said Adam; “and that’s all the promise you’ll get out of me.”

The tall thin grim sister had sat all the time as if she had no right to be aware of anything that was going on, but her nose, which was more hooked than her brother’s, and larger, looked as if, in the absence of eyes and ears, it was taking cognizance of everything, and would inform the rest of the senses afterwards.

I had a suspicion that the keeper’s ferocity was assumed for the occasion, and that he was not such an ogre as I had considered him. Still, the prospect of poor little Jamie spending the night alone in the loft amongst the cats and rats was sufficiently dreadful when I thought of my midnight awaking in the barn. There seemed to be no help, however, especially when Turkey rose to say good night.

I felt disconsolate, and was not well pleased with Turkey’s coolness. I thought he had not done his best.

When we got into the road—

“Poor Elsie!” I said; “she’ll be miserable about Jamie.”

“Oh no,” returned Turkey. “I’ll go straight over and tell her. No harm will come to Jamie. John Adam’s bark is a good deal worse than his bite. Only I should have liked to take him home if I could.”

It was now twilight, and through the glimmering dusk we walked back to the manse. Turkey left me at the gate and strode on towards the village; while I turned in, revolving a new scheme which had arisen in my brain, and for the first time a sense of rivalry with Turkey awoke in my bosom. He did everything for Elsie Duff, and I did nothing. For her he had robbed the bees’ nest that very day, and I had but partaken of the spoil. Nay, he had been stung in her service; for, with all my care—and I think that on the whole I had done my best—he had received what threatened to be a bad sting on the back of his neck. Now he was going to comfort her about her brother whom he had failed to rescue; but what if I should succeed where he had failed, and carry the poor boy home in triumph!

As we left the keeper’s farm, Turkey had pointed out to me, across the yard, where a small rick or two were standing, the loft in which Jamie would have to sleep. It was over the cart-shed, and its approach was a ladder. But for the reported rats, it would have been no hardship to sleep there in weather like this, especially for one who had been brought up as Jamie had been. But I knew that he was a very timid boy, and that I myself would have lain in horror all the night. Therefore I had all the way been turning over in my mind what I could do to release him. But whatever I did must be unaided, for I could not reckon upon Turkey, nor indeed was it in my heart to share with him the honour of the enterprise that opened before me.

CHAPTER XXIII
Knight-Errantry

I must mention that my father never objected now to my riding his little mare Missy, as we called her. Indeed, I had great liberty with regard to her, and took her out for a trot and a gallop as often as I pleased. Sometimes when there was a press of work she would have to go in a cart or drag a harrow, for she was so handy they could do anything with her; but this did not happen often, and her condition at all seasons of the year testified that she knew little of hard work. My father was very fond of her, and used to tell wonderful stories of her judgment and skill. I believe he was never quite without a hope that somehow or other he should find her again in the next world. At all events I am certain that it was hard for him to believe that so much wise affection should have been created to be again uncreated. I cannot say that I ever heard him give utterance to anything of the sort; but whence else should I have had such a firm conviction, dating from a period farther back than my memory can reach, that whatever might become of the other horses, Missy was sure to go to heaven? I had a kind of notion that, being the bearer of my father upon all his missions of doctrine and mercy, she belonged to the clergy, and, sharing in their privileges, must have a chance before other animals of her kind. I believe this was a right instinct glad of a foolish reason. I am wiser now, and extend the hope to the rest of the horses, for I cannot believe that the God who does nothing in vain ever creates in order to destroy.

I made haste to learn my lessons for the Monday, although it was but after a fashion, my mind was so full of the adventure before me. As soon as prayers and supper were over—that is, about ten o’clock—I crept out of the house and away to the stable. It was a lovely night. A kind of grey peace filled earth and air and sky. It was not dark, although rather cloudy; only a dim dusk, like a vapour of darkness, floated around everything. I was fond of being out at night, but I had never before contemplated going so far alone. I should not, however, feel alone with Missy under me, for she and I were on the best of terms, although sometimes she would take a fit of obstinacy, and refuse to go in any other than the direction she pleased. Of late, however, she had asserted herself less frequently in this manner. I suppose she was aware that I grew stronger and more determined.

I soon managed to open the door of the stable, for I knew where the key lay. It was very dark, but I felt my way through, talking all the time that the horses might not be startled if I came upon one of them unexpectedly, for the stable was narrow, and they sometimes lay a good bit out of their stalls. I took care, however, to speak in a low tone that the man who slept with only a wooden partition between him and the stable might not hear. I soon had the bridle upon Missy, but would not lose time in putting on the saddle. I led her out, got on her back with the help of a stone at the stable door, and rode away. She had scarcely been out all day, and was rather in the mood for a ride. The voice of Andrew, whom the noise of her feet had aroused, came after me, calling to know who it was. I called out in reply, for I feared he might rouse the place; and he went back composed, if not contented. It was no use, at all events, to follow me.

I had not gone far before the extreme stillness of the night began to sink into my soul and make me quiet. Everything seemed thinking about me, but nothing would tell me what it thought. Not feeling, however, that I was doing wrong, I was only awed not frightened by the stillness. I made Missy slacken her speed, and rode on more gently, in better harmony with the night. Not a sound broke the silence except the rough cry of the land-rail from the fields and the clatter of Missy’s feet. I did not like the noise she made, and got upon the grass, for here there was no fence. But the moment she felt the soft grass, off she went at a sudden gallop. Her head was out before I had the least warning of her intention. She tore away over the field in quite another direction from that in which I had been taking her, and the gallop quickened until she was going at her utmost speed. The rapidity of the motion and the darkness together—for it seemed darkness now—I confess made me frightened. I pulled hard at the reins, but without avail. In a minute I had lost my reckoning, and could not tell where I was in the field, which was a pretty large one; but soon finding that we were galloping down a hill so steep that I had trouble in retaining my seat, I began, not at all to my comfort, to surmise in what direction the mare was carrying me. We were approaching the place where we had sat that same afternoon, close by the mound with the trees upon it, the scene of my adventure with Wandering Willie, and of the fancied murder. I had scarcely thought of either until the shadows had begun to fall long, and now in the night, when all was shadow, both reflections made it horrible. Besides, if Missy should get into the bog! But she knew better than that, wild as her mood was. She avoided it, and galloped past, but bore me to a far more frightful goal, suddenly dropping into a canter, and then standing stock-still.

It was a cottage half in ruins, occupied by an old woman whom I dimly recollected having once gone with my father to see—a good many years ago, as it appeared to me now. She was still alive, however, very old, and bedridden. I recollected that from the top of her wooden bed hung a rope for her to pull herself up by when she wanted to turn, for she was very rheumatic, and this rope for some cause or other had filled me with horror. But there was more of the same sort. The cottage had once been a smithy, and the bellows had been left in its place. Now there is nothing particularly frightful about a pair of bellows, however large it may be, and yet the recollection of that huge structure of leather and wood, with the great iron nose projecting from the contracting cheeks of it, at the head of the old woman’s bed, so capable yet so useless, did return upon me with terror in the dusk of that lonely night. It was mingled with a vague suspicion that the old woman was a bit of a witch, and a very doubtful memory that she had been seen on one occasion by some night-farer, when a frightful storm was raging, blowing away at that very bellows as hard as her skinny arms and lean body could work the lever, so that there was almost as great a storm of wind in her little room as there was outside of it. If there was any truth in the story, it is easily accounted for by the fact that the poor old woman had been a little out of her mind for many years,—and no wonder, for she was nearly a hundred, they said. Neither is it any wonder that when Missy stopped almost suddenly, with her fore-feet and her neck stretched forward, and her nose pointed straight for the door of the cottage at a few yards’ distance, I should have felt very queer indeed. Whether my hair stood on end or not I do not know, but I certainly did feel my skin creep all over me. An ancient elder-tree grew at one end of the cottage, and I heard the lonely sigh of a little breeze wander through its branches. The next instant a frightful sound from within the cottage broke the night air into what seemed a universal shriek. Missy gave a plunge, turned round on her hind-legs, and tore from the place. I very nearly lost my seat, but terror made me cling the faster to my only companion, as ventre-à-terre she flew home. It did not take her a minute to reach the stable-door. There she had to stop, for I had shut it when I brought her out. It was mortifying to find myself there instead of under John Adam’s hayloft, the rescuer of Jamie Duff. But I did not think of that for a while. Shaken with terror, and afraid to dismount and be next the ground, I called upon Andrew as well as my fear would permit; but my voice was nearly unmanageable, and I could do little more than howl with it.

In a few minutes, to me a time of awful duration—for who could tell what might be following me up from the hollow?—Andrew appeared half-dressed, and not in the best of tempers, remarking it was an odd thing to go out riding when honest people were in their beds, except, he added, I meant to take to the highway. Thereupon, rendered more communicative by the trial I had gone through, I told him the whole story, what I had intended and how I had been frustrated. He listened, scratched his head, and saying someone ought to see if anything was the matter with the old woman, turned in to put on the rest of his clothes.

“You had better go home to bed, Ranald,” he said.

“Won’t you be frightened, Andrew?” I asked.

“Frightened? What should I be frightened at? It’s all waste to be frightened before you know whether the thing is worth it.”

My courage had been reviving fast in the warm presence of a human being. I was still seated on Missy. To go home having done nothing for Jamie, and therefore nothing for Elsie, after all my grand ideas of rescue and restoration, was too mortifying. I should feel so small when I woke in the morning! And yet suppose the something which gave that fearful cry in the cottage should be out roaming the fields and looking for mel I had courage enough, however, to remain where I was till Andrew came out again, and as I sat still on the mare’s back, my courage gradually rose. Nothing increases terror so much as running away. When he reappeared, I asked him:

“What do you think it could be, Andrew?”

“How should I tell?” returned Andrew. “The old woman has a very queer cock, I know, that always roosts on the top of her bed, and crows like no cock I ever heard crow. Or it might be Wandering Willie—he goes to see her sometimes, and the demented creature might strike up his pipes at any unearthly hour.”

I was not satisfied with either suggestion; but the sound I had heard had already grown so indistinct in my memory, that for anything I could tell it might have been either. The terror which it woke in my mind had rendered me incapable of making any observations or setting down any facts with regard to it. I could only remember that I had heard a frightful noise, but as to what it was like I could scarcely bear the smallest testimony.

I begged Andrew to put the saddle on for me, as I should then have more command of Missy. He went and got it, appearing, I thought, not at all over-anxious about old Betty; and I meantime buckled on an old rusty spur which lay in the stable window, the leathers of it crumbling off in flakes. Thus armed, and mounted with my feet in the stirrups, and therefore a good pull on Missy’s mouth, I found my courage once more equal to the task before me. Andrew and I parted at right angles; he across the field to old Betty’s cottage, and I along the road once more in the direction of John Adam’s farm.

CHAPTER XXIV
Failure

It must have been now about eleven o’clock. The clouds had cleared off, and the night had changed from brown and grey to blue sparkling with gold. I could see much better, and fancied I could hear better too. But neither advantage did much for me. I had not ridden far from the stable, before I again found myself very much alone and unprotected, with only the wide, silent fields about me, and the wider and more silent sky over my head. The fear began to return. I fancied something strange creeping along every ditch—something shapeless, but with a terrible cry in it. Next I thought I saw a scarcely visible form—now like a creature on all-fours, now like a man, far off, but coming rapidly towards me across the nearest field. It always vanished, however, before it came close. The worst of it was, that the faster I rode, the more frightened I became; for my speed seemed to draw the terrors the faster after me. Having discovered this, I changed my plan, and when I felt more frightened, drew rein and went slower. This was to throw a sort of defiance to the fear; and certainly as often as I did so it abated. Fear is a worse thing than danger.

I had to pass very nigh the pool to which Turkey and I had gone the night of our adventure with Bogbonny’s bull. That story was now far off in the past, but I did not relish the dull shine of the water in the hollow, notwithstanding. In fact I owed the greater part of the courage I possessed—and it was little enough for my needs—to Missy. I dared not have gone on my own two legs. It was not that I could so easily run away with four instead, but that somehow I was lifted above the ordinary level of fear by being upon her back. I think many men draw their courage out of their horses.

At length I came in sight of the keeper’s farm; and just at that moment the moon peeped from behind a hill, throwing as long shadows as the setting sun, but in the other direction. The shadows were very different too. Somehow they were liker to the light that made them than the sun-shadows are to the sunlight. Both the light and the shadows of the moon were strange and fearful to me. The sunlight and its shadows are all so strong and so real and so friendly, you seem to know all about them; they belong to your house, and they sweep all fear and dismay out of honest people’s hearts. But with the moon and its shadows it is very different indeed. The fact is, the moon is trying to do what she cannot do. She is trying to dispel a great sun-shadow—for the night is just the gathering into one mass of all the shadows of the sun. She is not able for this, for her light is not her own; it is second-hand from the sun himself; and her shadows therefore also are second-hand shadows, pieces cut out of the great sun-shadow, and coloured a little with the moon’s yellowness. If I were writing for grown people I should tell them that those who understand things because they think about them, and ask God to teach them, walk in the sunlight; and others, who take things because other people tell them so, are always walking in the strange moonlight, and are subject to no end of stumbles and terrors, for they hardly know light from darkness. Well, at first, the moon frightened me a little—she looked so knowing, and yet all she said round about me was so strange. But I rode quietly up to the back of the yard where the ricks stood, got off Missy and fastened the bridle to the gate, and walked across to the cart-shed, where the moon was shining upon the ladder leading up to the loft. I climbed the ladder, and after several failures succeeded in finding how the door was fastened. When I opened it, the moonlight got in before me, and poured all at once upon a heap of straw in the farthest corner, where Jamie was lying asleep with a rug over him. I crossed the floor, knelt down by him, and tried to wake him. This was not so easy. He was far too sound asleep to be troubled by the rats; for sleep is an armour—yes, a castle—against many enemies. I got hold of one of his hands, and in lifting it to pull him up found a cord tied to his wrist. I was indignant: they had actually manacled him like a thief! I gave the cord a great tug of anger, pulled out my knife, and cut it; then, hauling Jamie up, got him half-awake at last. He stared with fright first, and then began to cry. As soon as he was awake enough to know me, he stopped crying but not staring, and his eyes seemed to have nothing better than moonlight in them.

“Come along, Jamie,” I said. “I’m come to take you home.”

“I don’t want to go home,” said Jamie. “I want to go to sleep again.”

“That’s very ungrateful of you, Jamie,” I said, full of my own importance, “when I’ve come so far, and all at night too, to set you free.”

“I’m free enough,” said Jamie. “I had a better supper a great deal than I should have had at home. I don’t want to go before the morning.”

And he began to whimper again.

“Do you call this free?” I said, holding up his wrist where the remnant of the cord was hanging.

“Oh!” said Jamie, “that’s only—”

But ere he got farther the moonlight in the loft was darkened. I looked hurriedly towards the door. There stood the strangest figure, with the moon behind it. I thought at first it was the Kelpie come after me, for it was a tall woman. My heart gave a great jump up, but I swallowed it down. I would not disgrace myself before Jamie. It was not the Kelpie, however, but the keeper’s sister, the great, grim, gaunt woman I had seen at the table at supper. I will not attempt to describe her appearance. It was peculiar enough, for she had just got out of bed and thrown an old shawl about her. She was not pleasant to look at. I had myself raised the apparition, for, as Jamie explained to me afterwards, the cord which was tied to his wrist, instead of being meant to keep him a prisoner, was a device of her kindness to keep him from being too frightened. The other end had been tied to her wrist, that if anything happened he might pull her, and then she would come to him.

“What’s the matter, Jamie Duff?” she said in a gruff voice as she advanced along the stream of moonlight.

I stood up as bravely as I could.

“It’s only me, Miss Adam,” I said.

“And who are you?” she returned.

“Ranald Bannerman,” I answered.

“Oh!” she said in a puzzled tone. “What are you doing here at this time of the night?”

“I came to take Jamie home, but he won’t go.”

“You’re a silly boy to think my brother John would do him any harm,” she returned. “You’re comfortable enough, aren’t you, Jamie Duff?”

“Yes, thank you, ma’am, quite comfortable,” said Jamie, who was now wide-awake. “But, please ma’am, Ranald didn’t mean any harm.”

“He’s a housebreaker, though,” she rejoined with a grim chuckle; “and he’d better go home again as fast as he can. If John Adam should come out, I don’t exactly know what might happen. Or perhaps he’d like to stop and keep you company.”

“No, thank you, Miss Adam,” I said. “I will go home.”

“Come along, then, and let me shut the door after you.”

Somewhat nettled with Jamie Duff’s indifference to my well-meant exertions on his behalf, I followed her without even bidding him good night.

“Oh, you’ve got Missy, have you?” she said, spying her where she stood. “Would you like a drink of milk or a piece of oatcake before you go?”

“No, thank you,” I said. “I shall be glad to go to bed.”

“I should think so,” she answered. “Jamie is quite comfortable, I assure you; and I’ll take care he’s in time for school in the morning. There’s no harm in him, poor thing!”

She undid the bridle for me, helped me to mount in the kindest way, bade me good night, and stood looking after me till I was some distance off. I went home at a good gallop, took off the saddle and bridle and laid them in a cart in the shed, turned Missy loose into the stable, shut the door, and ran across the field to the manse, desiring nothing but bed.

When I came near the house from the back, I saw a figure entering the gate from the front. It was in the full light of the moon, which was now up a good way. Before it had reached the door I had got behind the next corner, and peeping round saw that my first impression was correct: it was the Kelpie. She entered, and closed the door behind her very softly. Afraid of being locked out, a danger which had scarcely occurred to me before, I hastened after her; but finding the door already fast, I called through the keyhole. She gave a cry of alarm, but presently opened the door, looking pale and frightened.

“What are you doing out of doors this time of the night?” she asked, but without quite her usual arrogance, for, although she tried to put it on, her voice trembled too much.

I retorted the question.

“What were you doing out yourself?” I said.

“Looking after you, of course.”

“That’s why you locked the door, I suppose—to keep me out.”

She had no answer ready, but looked as if she would have struck me.

“I shall let your father know of your goings on,” she said, recovering herself a little.

“You need not take the trouble. I shall tell him myself at breakfast to-morrow morning. I have nothing to hide. You had better tell him too.”

I said this not that I did not believe she had been out to look for me, but because I thought she had locked the door to annoy me, and I wanted to take my revenge in rudeness. For doors were seldom locked in the summer nights in that part of the country. She made me no reply, but turned and left me, not even shutting the door. I closed it, and went to bed weary enough.