Part 8

I answered him no, but by all accounts the contrary. I told him that I had once been in the house of Kerse, and that none there (including myself, I might have added with truth) seemed to be greatly oppressed with any overload of the Christian virtues.

When we came near we were aware of a wide and vacant house, all the doors open to the wall, stables and barn alike void and empty. Not so much as a dog stirring. But from the house end that looked down the water, there came the crying of this great voice of one unseen. Mid-noon though it was, and I with the most noted minister in Scotland by my side, I declare that I felt eerie. Indeed, I have never cared for coming on a habited house, when it stands empty with all the furniture of service left where the folk laid them down, and finding no one therein. Such a place is full of footfalls and whispers, and a kirkyard at midnight is not more uncanny, at least not to my thought.

'It sounds much like a man blaspheming his Maker,' said the Minister.

We rode round an angle of the wall, where there was a flanking tower; and there, straight before us, sitting on a high oaken chair under a green tree, was old David Crauford of Kerse, his head thrown forward, his hands clenched, his eyes fixed on the brow of the hill over which his sons had gone--while from his mouth there came an astounding stream of oaths and cursings, of which, so far as one could grasp it, the main purpose seemed to be the sending of every Kennedy that ever drew the breath of life directly and eternally to the abodes of the damned.

We dismounted leisurely from our horses, and reined them loosely to the rings in the louping-on stone at the house end. Then Maister Bruce strode forward and stood in front of the old man, who had never for a moment noticed us nor ceased from his earth-shaking cursings.

Not until the tall and dark figure of the Minister had blotted out the point of the hill towards which he looked, did the old man intermit his speech. Then he drew his hand slowly across his brow, and threw his head back as if to distinguish whether it were indeed a living man who stood before him.

'I am Robert Bruce, Minister of the Town of Edinburgh,' said my companion, 'and I come from His Majesty the King of Scotland, to bid you make an end of this evil and universal regardlessness, which has polluted the whole country with cruelty and dissension, with public factions and private deadly feuds--'

Old David Crauford leaned forward in his chair and set his hand to his ear, as though he had not heard a word of the Minister's speech.

'What say ye, man?' he cried, testily, like one who is stayed from his purpose by childish pranks.

'I say,' said the Minister, stoutly, 'that the disquieting of the lieges with jacks, breast-plates, plate-sleeves, and pistols is as much dishonouring to God as it is distasteful to His Majesty the King--'

'Hear ye me, my man. Hae ye done?' said old David, glowering at him.

'Are you a Christian man?' said the Minister, sternly, 'or,' he added, as if on second thoughts, 'a loyal subject of King James the Sixth?'

'Christian!' cried the old man with great indignation. 'Do you speer me gin I am a Christian? Man, do ye no ken that I am an Ayrshireman? An' as for a loyal subject of King Jamie, man, I hae been four score year and ten in the world, and proud am I to say that three score and sax o' them hae been at the King's Horn for rebel and outlaw--an' never a penny the waur o' either, being ever willing and able to keep my ain heid and haud my ain land again baith prince and Providence!'

'Old man,' said the Minister, sternly, 'ken ye that ye speak blasphemies. Know ye not that for every word ye utter, God shall enter into judgment with you?'

'Verra likely,' said David Crauford, drily. 'Stand oot o' my licht, man, I canna see through ye. Gin ye dinna, this pistol will enter into judgment wi' you.'

The Minister stepped aside--not, as I think, at all for fear of the pistol, but despairing of reaching the conscience of such a seared and battered heathen.

Then suddenly the old man rose from his seat as one that sees a heavenly vision. His face appeared transfigured and shining, and, with his white hair falling on his shoulders, I declare he looked like the Apostle Andrew in the Papish window of the High Kirk of Edinburgh.

'I see him! I see him!' he cried. 'He comes with the tidings of battle.'

I looked where he pointed with his eyes, but could see nothing save a black dot, which seemed to rise and fall steadily. Nevertheless, the old man spoke the truth. It was, indeed, a swift rider making straight for the house of Kerse.

As the man came nearer we saw him spur his horse till it stumbled and fell at the park dykes, weary or wounded, we could not tell which. This roused David Crauford, and he shouted to the man who now came on lamely on foot.

'Man, is the sow flitted?' he cried.

The man, peching and blown with his haste, could not answer till he came near.

'Is the sow flitted?' again shouted the old man.

'Oh, Laird Kerse,' cried the messenger, the tears trickling down his face, 'pity this sorrowfu' day! There has been a waesome slaughter o' your folk--ten o' them are dead--'

'Is the sow flitted?' cried Crauford, louder than ever. 'Can you no answer, yea or nay?'

'Oh, Kerse, hear me and weep; your braw and bonny son Jock, the flower of Kyle, is stricken through the heart, and lies cauld and dead on the ground.'

'Scoundrel, dolt, yammering calf, answer or die. Is the sow flitted?' The patriarch stood up on his feet, fiercely threatening the messenger with his staff.

'The sow is flitted,' cried the man. That and no more.

The old man fairly danced in a whirling triumph, cracking his fingers in the air with joy like a boy.

'My thumb for Jock!' cried he, 'the sow's flitted!'

And with that he dropped slack and senseless upon his great chair.

The Minister took my arm and led me to the louping-on stone.

'Come away,' he said sadly, 'it is no use. Ephraim hath too long been joined to his idols. Let him alone. It is as guid Maister Knox foretold. The Word of God is indeed made of none effect in Kyle and Carrick.'

*CHAPTER XIII*

*THE TRYST AT MIDNIGHT*

From Robert Harburgh I got the tidings of the disaster that had befallen the Cassillis' arms soon after I had ridden away with the Minister of Edinburgh. The Craufords were in no hurry to come on in spite of all the taunts of the Earl, and the disordered noise of the foul beast which for despite he had tied on their lands.

But they kept outposts on the hills about, and they looked often this way and that way--even I had seen them. Then began a waving of flags and crying of words, till once more their line settled into place, and from the north and the south at once fresh bands of horsemen came riding towards us. And as they came nearer, the Cassillis folk saw that they from the North were led on by James Mure the younger of Auchendrayne, and from the south there came the band of outlaws and robbers that called Thomas of Drummurchie their captain. On two sides these beset us, with only the river between, and the Craufords began to gather more closely than ever on our front.

Then the Earl remembered that what Dom Nicholas and I had done so easily in the crossing of the Doon, other men as determined might also do. But being, as I have said, by nature a brave man, he first awaited the event. Nor was it long before, at a given signal, Drummurchie and young Auchendrayne set their horses to the water and came at us through the bends of the river, in spite of the shots that rained upon them, and the men that dropped from their seats and spun down the flooded Doon. For it was soon after the time of the Lammas floods, and the water was yet drumlie and wan.

In our front the Craufords raged, and altogether in a trice our position was wholly turned.

'This is not well done,' cried our Earl to Thomas of Drummurchie, as he laid stoutly about him. 'Thy brother had not so have treated his chief, when he strove with the enemies of the clan. Wolf should not tear wolf, nor Kennedy Kennedy!'

In a little it was seen that the promontory could not be kept in face of a force three times our number, and specially when those of our own name and ancient alliance were striving against us.

'Out of the neck of the bottle, and keep together!' cried the Earl, who on stricken field was no shaveling.

So with that, Earl John led his people straight across the water at the point of the land that jutted between the forces of Auchendrayne that came from the north, and Drummurchie's desperate riders who beset us on the south. So swiftly was this done that before they could close or the Craufords come on, most part of the Cassillis folk had passed Doon water. Though there were twenty at the least who were either drowned or else wounded to death, where they had fought the wager out on the fair holms of Dalrymple.

It so befel as the Minister and I were riding home, that we came on our little company of Culzean lads riding with tired horses and slack reins shorewards. And God be thanked for His ill-deserved mercy, in the quarrel that had been so evilly settled, there was no loss to Culzean. For we came not home with a single empty saddle, nor was there so much as a pike staff left behind. The last of it that they heard was the shouts of the Craufords as they flitted the sow over the water to the lands of Kennedy, thus clearing their own borders ere set of sun, according to their boast and promise.

On the morrow's morn there came to each Kennedy's gate a little squealing pigling with the Cassillis colours of blue and gold tied in derision to its curled tail. And round its neck was this motto, 'The flitted sow of Cassillis hath pigged, and Crauford of Kerse sends the litter home!'

And so in like manner was done at the house of every Kennedy that had men at the fight of the sow-flitting, whether they lived near or far. But who left them at the yetts, none saw. All which was more likely to be a ploy of Thomas of Drummurchie or John Mure's than of the Craufords--who, to do them justice, had small skill in aught save hard strokes, but plenty of that. For even to this day there is small civility or scholarship about Kyle Stewart and King's Kyle.

Now there was no mistaking but that we came home with our fingers in our mouths, and the countryside jeers at us of Cassillis and Culzean were many as the leaves of the summer trees. Nor could I win belief that I had been, by command of the Earl, at the house of Kerse along with the Minister, instead of on the green inch of Dalrymple by Skeldon haughs. For, believe it who will, there are many right willing to have a catch at me; though, God knows, I had never gone out of my way to put a slight upon any man, nor yet thought more highly of myself than I ought to think.

In time, however, the bitterness died down, and at Culzean things went their wonted quiet way. It is true that Nell Kennedy never so much as looked the way I was on. I heard that she went about telling everyone whom she thought would carry the tale to me, that I had gotten the Earl's sword for procuring the sow of Skeldon, and carrying her over Doon water on my back. But this was no more than spite, easily seen through, and I minded it not. For everyone in Carrick knew the cause why I had gotten the blade from the Earl, who, indeed, is not a man to give aught for naught, nor yet to bestow where, with honour, he might withhold.

But to balance the beam, Marjorie was kinder to me than ever she had been, so that I thought of a surety that her heart had at last been touched by love. But as it chanced, I was to get news of that before I was greatly older.

As the thing fell out, one night I had been somewhat late out of bed, visiting of a friend whose name it does not advantage to set down here. And in the morning, while yet it was dark, I was returning by the rough shore tracks to the coves, from whence I had to clamber warily up, in order to reach my ladder of rope which depended, as of old, from the overhanging turret of the White Tower.

As I stood to breathe a while in the quiet of the cove, I was aware of voices that spoke above me, for the sea was quiet and the moon dipping down to the setting. My thoughts were running at the time on treasure-seeking, for among the things I had had on my mind that night there was the matter of the losing of the Kelwood treasure in the House of the Red Moss. Thinking that I might learn something of importance, I hasted to clamber in the direction from which came the voices. And as I glided along the foot of the rocks in the black shadow, I came almost without warning upon two who stood close together.

I could not go back. I could not go forward. I could only retreat sideways as far as the rock would let me, and even then I stood within a few feet of the speakers.

At the first words I knew them. It was Marjorie Kennedy of Culzean talking with Gilbert of Bargany, the enemy of her house and of us all. The blood settled sharply chill about my heart, and the bitterness of death seemed to come upon me. The maid to whom my heart had gone out, to whom I had looked up as my liege lady, was standing here in midnight converse with the sworn enemy of her race and of her father.

But I had no time for consideration--none for deciding what I should do. I was no eavesdropper, yet for my life I could not go forth and confront them.

I could hear Gilbert Kennedy's words. They were pleading and passionate words.

'Hear me, listen to me, Marjorie,' he said, and I could see his uncovered head turned towards her where she stood black between me and the sea, 'I love no one but you. I have sought none but you. Ever since I was a stripling lad, like your young Launcelot Kennedy, have not I given you worship and service? Why then do you hate me, despise me, turn away from me?'

As I listened my heart rose again in hope. 'Your Launcelot Kennedy,' he had said. It might be that I, even I, was the cause why Marjorie turned from him as he said.

'Gilbert,' said Marjorie Kennedy, and her voice was like the still waters of a sheltered sea lapping on the wet sands, 'I do not turn from you. I am not proud with you. If I were, would I be here to-night? But in spite of this I am trysted to another fate. If there is to be any use in my life, it is that I may become the sacrifice that is to compose this quarrel. And it cannot be with you for husband.'

'And wherefore not?' said Bargany fiercely, striking one hand into the hollow palm of the other.

Marjorie put out one of her own hands as if to restrain him.

'I will put you to the test,' said she; 'if I were Lady Bargany, would you submit to John, Earl of Cassillis, and be his man, setting aside all your ancient quarrels, and acknowledging him as your liege lord?'

'God forbid!' said Bargany, promptly.

Marjorie put out her other hand for him to take.

'And I like you the better for it, Gilbert,' she said impulsively.

Bargany set her fingers to his lips, and held her hands as if he could never let them go.

'Then,' said she, 'since this bitter strife and the killing of friends must somehow be stopped, and since you would not stop it even for me--who am I that I should not be at my father's command, to give and to take, to be sold and bought like a beast in the market-place?'

'Who talks of buying and selling?' interrupted Bargany, roughly. 'Give me but a look of your eyes, and I will carry you to my house of Bargany, and see if any dare to take you from the safe keeping of Gilbert Kennedy.'

'And my father?' said she, speaking very quietly, but clearly, so that I heard every word.

'Your father,' answered Bargany, 'is a good man--too good for such a crew. He has married one daughter to the young Sheriff of Galloway. Wherefore not another to his cousin of Bargany? Is not Kennedy of Bargany, even though he be an enemy, better than any noltish Galloway laird?'

'Ah,' said Marjorie Kennedy, softly, 'but there is another reason--'

'Tell it me and I will answer it,' said Bargany, with a swift fierceness, for I think he imagined that he was making head against her scruples. But I had heard her speak in that still way before, and could have told him different.

'Isobel Stewart, bower-maiden to the Queen, and the Earldom of Carrick--they are surely reasons enough!' said Marjorie Kennedy.

Bargany started as though an adder had stung him. For a moment he seemed bereft of speech.

'Who has been lying to you of me?' he said, almost under his breath, as though the night air had suddenly made him hoarse.

'Nay, think again,' said Marjorie; 'is it not true? Better a soiled bower-maiden of the King's court and an earldom with her, than poor Marjorie Kennedy of Culzean in her smock!'

I never heard her say a spiteful thing before nor since--but when it comes to the matter of the Other Woman, all women are alike.

Bargany stamped his foot in very anger.

'A fig for dignities, and a rotten fig for Isobel Stewart,' he cried. 'I love but you, Marjorie Kennedy! Will you come to me, so that you and I may face the world together? For it is a black world and needs two hearts that can stand by each other.'

Then betwixt me and the sea (as I have said) I saw Marjorie knitting and clasping her hands as if her spirit were wrestling within her.

'Yea, Gilbert,' she said, very gently at last, 'it is as you say, a black, black world. But neither you nor I are going to better it by the breaking of trysts and engagements!'

'And what tryst have you?' he demanded sullenly.

'I am trysted to sorrow,' she answered, 'trysted for ever to want that which most I desire, and to have that which most I hate. Gilbert Kennedy, take my hand this once and hearken. You and I are too greatly like one another to be happy together. We are not mates born for smooth things. Sorrow is our dower and suffering our weird, and the pity of it is that we must dree it apart. I think we are both "fey" to-night,' she said, breaking off with a change of tone. 'We had best go within.'

'Within?' said Bargany, scornfully, for he bethought him that he could never enter the house of Culzean as a friend.

'Now, Gilbert,' said Marjorie, 'be a man and forgive. Be a man also to Isobel Stewart, that she may know you a truer man than she has ever met in King's courts--ay, truer and nobler, as I think you, than the King himself. And let me go my way....' She covered her face with her hands and stood a space silent and bowed. 'Let me go my way!' she said again. And so would have gone from him.

But Gilbert Kennedy had her in his two arms and was kissing her mouth, and that often and passionately.

'No,' he said, 'I will not let you go. I will take you in spite of all--though there were at Culzean a thousand fathers--at Cassillis a thousand earls!'

She withdrew herself from him with quiet dignity, yet without anger.

'But you will not take me in spite of one Marjorie Kennedy,' she said.

Then at this, quick as a musket flash, Bargany turned on his heel and tramped angrily down the shingle of the shore, his sword clanking and his spurs ringing, as careless who might hear as if he had been crossing the paved court of his own house of Bargany.

And Marjorie Kennedy stood still and watched him go, her hands pressed to her bosom, as though it needed both to still the dreadful beating of her heart.

'I love him! I love him!' she cried to the stillness, when he was quite gone. 'Oh, that he might trample me, that his hand might slay me, so that in death he might lift up my head and say once again, "I love you."'

And so she also passed away within.

Then I, in my corner, where I had been an unwilling hearkener, set my face between my knees and thought that the world would never be bright again. For I had heard that which I had heard, and I knew now that Marjorie, my Lady Marjorie, would never know love for me while the world lasted.

Nevertheless, I rose up and clambered aloft to reach my rope ladder. I climbed over the rocks, thoughtlessly, heedlessly, and I scraped my shoe so that it sounded loud in the still night. Suddenly I saw something bright above me, the flicker of a white robe. I had nearly fallen, thinking that the appearance might be a spirit of the darkness.

'Dinna be feared, night-raker,' said a voice I knew well; 'it is only Nell Kennedy. Think ye that none can climb up the W hite Tower besides yourself?'

I was so greatly astonished that I could not speak at once.

'What may you be doing there at this time of the morning, Nell?' I said at last.

'Just like yourself--trying to find a quiet way to my bed,' said she; 'but I must hasten, or I shall be late to let in Marjorie.'

'What Marjorie,' said I, pretending that I knew nothing of the matter.

'Lie to other folk gin ye like, Spurheel,' said the madcap, contemptuously, 'but dinna think ye can lie to Nell Kennedy. I saw ye come from the hole down by the Cove.'

'But what do you here, Nell?' said I, for it might be that the mad lassie had a lad, and it seemed a terrible thing that she should be so misguided at her age as to meet him alone by night.

'Maybe I was down by seeing Kate Allison, the Grieve's lassie,' said she. 'Do you honestly think, Spurheel, that Helen Kennedy would permit a sister of hers to gang jooking here and there about the shore wi' a bonny young man at the dead of nicht all by her lone? It is not very likely.'

I said no more. It was not easy to argle-bargle with Nell Kennedy.

'And now betake yourself up the rope to your garret,' she said, 'and I will follow after, for I must let our Maidie in by the east door or it grows light.'

I motioned her to go first, but she turned on me in great indignation.

'Hear ye, Spurheel, up wi' ye! And if ye so much as set your nose oot o' your window when I am on the rope, it will no be telling you.'

So I climbed up and shut-to the window, and long before I was settled in bed I heard the two sisters talking softly together in the room beneath. So I knew that Nell Kennedy had carried out her mad ploy.

*CHAPTER XIV*

*THE ADVENTURE OF THE GARDEN*

I need not tell all the reasons why my well-beloved and kindly master, Sir Thomas Kennedy, had grown to be hated with a deadly feud by all the ill-conditioned of the Bargany faction, saving indeed by Gilbert Kennedy of Bargany himself. For one thing, my master was the man of the best and wisest counsels among all the supporters of Cassillis. He had many virtues, being well-liked wherever he went for kindliness and courteousness. Also he was a man of good principles and religion, so far as the times permitted, and indeed somewhat beyond, as he found to his own bitter cost or all was done.

Still more, my master Culzean was never one to suspect evil of any man, and was ever prone to cover wrack and ruin by over-trust and graciousness.

The first act of a great and wide conspiracy to compass his death was now to be played, for Thomas of Drummurchie, the brother of young Bargany, was not of so lofty a spirit as his chief. Indeed, to speak plainly, he was no better than an assassin and a common bully. He caused all the country-side to lie in terror for fear of him, being great with none, save only with the Lairds of Auchendrayne,--which was a strange thing considering their outward profession of strict honour.