CHAPTER VI.

THE SEDAN.

ADURNI. I will stand The roughness of the encounter, like a gentleman, And wait ye to your homes, whate'er befal me. THE LADY'S TRIAL.

Lord Clermistonlee, as he anticipated, reached the Earl of Dunbarton's house just when the company were separating. The guard of horse was drawn up in the court-yard in courtesy to the guests. Lumbering old-fashioned carriages were rolling solemnly away; sedans, borne by liveried chairmen, and having lighted links flaring in the night-wind before and behind them, were carried off at a trot through the dark and devious windings of the city. The court on the north side of the mansion was becoming comparatively still and empty, and Clermistonlee, with no small anxiety for the success of his plot, looked on all sides for his faithful Juden; but that pink of butlers and factotum of his household was nowhere visible, and he searched in vain for the green livery of Clermont faced with scarlet.

At this crisis a sedan approached bearing the blazon of Napier in a widow's lozenge. It was borne by two men, in whom, though attired as public chairmen, Clermistonlee recognised Juden and his nephew Jock, a strong, lank-bodied fellow, who acted as valet, groom, errand-boy, turnspit, &c., at his Lordship's lodging. He had coarse pimply features, high cheek-bones, and a shock head of red hair waving under a broad bonnet, piggish eyes, and a mouth of vast circumference. His whole vocabulary consisted of a deep gutteral _ay_, with which he replied to everything and everybody. Half knave, half idiot, he was just the kind of ally required by Clermistonlee, to whom he was intensely devoted, and to whom he looked up as something more than a demigod.

"I am glad you have doffed the green and scarlet," said the lord. "You have been a thought beyond me to-night, Juden. Have her ladyship's sedans been summoned?"

"Half-an-hour syne, my lord."

"Indeed!" rejoined the other, in a breathless voice, and letting fall the rocquelaure which muffled his face. "Mistress Lilian is not departed! Rascal, if she has----"

"Hooly and fairly: we have just come for her, by her ladyship's orders," grinned Juden. "A weary tramp we had to Bruntisfield wi' the auld dame (devil tak' her!); but we coupit her at Dalryburn--ha! ha!"

"How, sirrah? where were her chairmen?"

"Where they are even now--in the water-hole of the town-guard--a dungeon vaulted wi' stane, dark as pitch, and half fu' o' water. Gif your lordship does na ken sic a place, owre weel do I, for there I passed fifteen weary days and eerie nights, after Bothwellbrig, shivering like a rat in an ice-house."

"Gomeral! is this a place for thy pestilent reminiscences of Bothwell? Ye obeyed my orders?"

"To the letter o' the law, as my lord Mersington says. I have made Lady Grisel's servitors as fu' as strong October, reeking usquebaugh, ay, and a three gallon runlet of gude red Rhenish, at sixpence the quart, could make them. But then, by way o' repaying my hospitality, they began misnaming your Lordship."

"What said the knaves?"

"That ye were but a cock-laird o' Cramond, for a' your baron's coronet, and a fause whig and misleared covenanter at heart."

"Foh! it matters not," replied Clermistonlee. "I will have all those varlets under my thumb ere long, and then I will teach them the respect that is due to my coronet. A cock-laird! By all the devils, they shall have their tongues bodkinned, and their ears nailed to the Tron, as a terror to all such plebeian rascals. But what didst thou, and this great baboon thy nephew, when these rascals made so free with our family?"

"We sweeped the house wi' the hair o' their heads--eh, Jock?"

"Ay," gaped the personage appealed to.

"My birse rose at the first word, and drawing my whinger, I fell on like a Stenton. Jock threw owre the buird and settles, and laid about him wi' a three-leggit stule. The gudewife o' the change-house scraighed like a howlet, and a' gaed to wreck. Shelves o' dishes and tin flagons, caups and luggies, Leith crystal and Delft ware, iron pots and pewter trenchers, a' flew like a hailstorm, and we laid about us like naething that I mind o', but the tulzie at Bothwell, when Dalyel's troopers broke the brig-ward, and fell on us sword in hand."

"Bothwell again! Rascal, how often must I tell thee to recur to those days no more?"

"In burst the toun-guard, wi' axe and pike, and carried them a' to the water-hole, as disturbers o' the peace."

"And how did you escape?"

"At the very sight o' the red wyvern on my sleeve, the loons let me go, as if my gude braid claith had been iron in a white heat: and sae I am here."

"Excellent! for this night her people are safe. Thou art a priceless fellow, Juden."

"When Lady Grisel's men were summoned, we changed our coats, and in their places came as ye see. We bore her awa to the Place o' Bruntisfield, and are now, by her orders, returned for Madam Lilian."

"Heaven is propitious to me to-night. But I fear me, thy dullard of a nephew may spoil all."

At that moment the voice of the earl's chamberlain was heard summoning "Mistress Napier's chair," and with much pretended bustle, Juden and his cunning nephew, in their assumed character of hack-chairmen, carried it up the broad flight of steps into the brilliantly-lighted lobby, while, with a beating heart, Clermistonlee withdrew a little, to observe the issue of his plans.

He waited what appeared to be an age; for Juden and his nephew had been desired to remain in the court without for a time; and when again they were summoned, Lilian Napier was in the chair, and when it was brought forth, the little blinds of scarlet silk were so closely drawn that Clermistonlee could not discern the least part of that fairy form, over the beauties of which he revelled in fancy; and his swart cheek glowed, his pulses quickened, as his unscrupulous serving-men approached at a slow trot, carrying with ease the sedan, though it was ponderous with black leather, gilded nails, and armorial bosses.

Equally pleased and surprised that Walter Fenton was not escorting it, Clermistonlee (who had pre-arranged to leave him dead among the fields) silently opened the gate of the court which led to the westward, and shrinking behind the shadow of a wall, almost held his breath as the vehicle passed which contained that fair being for whose possession he was risking so much odium and danger; but neither were new to him. Regardless of the feelings of others, and dead to every sense of honour, save that bull-headed valour which made the cavaliers of his day fight to the death for matters of less value than a soap-bubble, he had long been accustomed to gratify without a scruple his strong and unruly passions.

He breathed more freely as his followers traversed the deserted road that led to the barrier of Bristo, and thence striking westward, proceeded by a narrow horseway leading to the thatched hamlet and manor-house of Lauriston, a suburb a few hundred yards from the city wall, which, with its row of embattled bastelhouses, rose on the right hand.

It was a long and monotonous line of crenelated wall, the outline of which was broken only by the spire of the old Greyfriars' Kirk (which was accidentally blown-up in 1718 by powder stored therein by the thrifty bailies of Edinburgh), the turrets of Heriot's Hospital, and at intervals a fantastic stack of great black chimnies studded with oyster-shells. On the left were fields of waving grain, and rows of foliaged trees, that spread over the gradual slope to the sandy margin of the beautiful lake. The little village was buried in silence and sleep; all was hushed under the green thatch of its humble cots. Scarcely a star was visible; it was nearly midnight, and utter solitude surrounded them.

Poor Lilian! Her daring abductor had not as yet formed any defined plan of ultimate procedure. His first object was to have Lilian completely at his mercy, and nowhere could she be more so, than in the strong and solitary house of Drumsheugh, watched by the infamous being introduced to the reader in the preceding chapter.

Within the grated chambers of that house, which he had made the scene of a thousand enormities, Clermistonlee hoped soon by terror, persuasion, or force, to overcome the repugnance Lilian had so long expressed for his addresses. The cold, but decided refusal, of old Lady Grisel, the startled dismay and ill-concealed hauteur of Lilian, when but a few months before he had made a somewhat abrupt and unexpected proposal for her hand, now rose vividly to his mind, and spurred him on to triumph and revenge.

He contemplated with a malicious satisfaction, that even if to-morrow, or a week hence, he should free Lilian from durance, she would go forth with a stain upon her reputation, and imputations upon her honour, worse than death to a girl of her delicacy and spirit--imputations which ultimately might force the proud little beauty into his arms, when the web of his machinations was stronger, and when even her lover would shrink from her as from one contaminated.

Then would be his hour of triumph! and--but here his cogitations were interrupted by the yelling of a great wolf-dog, which thrust its black nose through the barbican-gate of the Highriggs, and barked furiously.

Clermistonlee had hoped that, fatigued with dancing and the lateness of the hour, sleep had overpowered Lilian, and now he trembled lest she should awake, and by her cries summon aid to her rescue from this old baronial mansion, which terminated the Portsburgh. In wrath, he thrust with his long rapier at the dog; but its baying redoubled, and, in great consternation, Juden and Jock hurried northward down the slope at their utmost speed. To the joy of Clermistonlee, his fair captive expressed no alarm, and the curtains of the sedan remained undrawn. Her voice was unheard, and no sound broke the stillness of the place, save the wind sweeping over the fields, and the tramp of the chairmen's feet, as they ascended by a narrow bridle path to the ancient gate of Drumsheugh.

"She is mine at last!" exclaimed the triumphant roué, through his clenched teeth, as they entered the damp gloomy avenue. "Ha, Master Fenton, I have the odds of thee! Ha, ha! Not all hell itself could save her from me now."

At the base of a tower where a small doorway gave entrance to the house, Juden, who was in front, to his great tribulation, saw Beatrix Gilruth with a long pikestaff in one hand, and an iron cresset in the other. She held it aloft at the full stretch of her meagre arm, and fitfully the flame streamed in the night-wind, casting a bright but uncertain glare on her pinched unearthly features, her sunken eyes, matted hair, and tattered attire, on the mossgreen walls, the grated windows, and striking façade of the ancient mansion, and the thick trees that grew around it, revealing the dewy leaves and threads of silver gossamer that spread from branch to branch--but Beatrix was the most striking object, for the wildness of her air imparted to her the aspect of an antique Pythoness, a sorceress, or maniac. Juden fearfully eyed her askance.

"Gude e'en to ye, cummer," said he breathlessly.

"Evening? ye feared gowk!" retorted Beatrix. "'Tis the dead hour of midnight, as ye may know by putting your neb oure the kirkyard dyke, where mair may be seen than ye reckon on. Behold the light that dances in yonder hollow."

Juden looked down the long avenue, which the dense foliage caused to resemble a leafy tunnel, and saw far off a lambent and uncertain light playing in the distance.

"'Tis a corpse candle!" screamed Beatrix. "It glints above the grave of an unchristened wean. Hah, fool! frightened as ye are for it, the day is not far off when the same deidlicht will be dancing among the grass that covers your own."

Perspiration burst over Juden's brow, while the woman enjoying the terror she created, uttered a wild laugh.

"My Lord--Jock--I tak ye to witness she foretells my wierd--a clear case o' malice and sorcery as ever came before the Fifteen. But I defy ye, Lucky Gilruth, for the barrels are tarred that shall send thee to the fires o' eternity, ye shameless limmer." Juden trembled between pious confidence and deadly fear--like one who in a dream defies a fiend.

"Hark to St. Cuthbert's bell?" continued Beatrix, who appeared to find a satisfaction in the fear and aversion she created. "Now shall ye behold the spirits of the dead, that many a time and oft on this returning night, I have seen rush forth from yonder woods,--Sir Patrick of Blackadder, and his slayers, Douglas, Hume, and Clermistonlee. Like the driven cloud, they fly without a sound along the gloomy avenue--pursuers and pursued, their swords flashing and their hell-forged harness glinting, as they sweep like shadows oure the dewy grass, with the stars shining through the ribs of their skeleton horses, till the spirit of Blackadder plunges into the loch, as it did on his dying day--then red flash their petronels, and the pure water sparkles around them like diamonds in the moonlight--an eldritch yell arises from its shining bosom, and all is over!"

"What mummery is this, thou eternal babbler?" said Clermistonlee, in a voice of suppressed passion. "Woman, Beatrix, silence, lest I strangle thee!"

The sedan was now within the vaulted ambulatory of the mansion; and the door was securely bolted by Juden, while his master, who had begun to feel no little surprise and anxiety at the silence maintained by Lilian, advanced hurriedly to the chair; but first whispered to his old paramour:

"A word, Beatrix,--is the wainscoted room in the turret prepared for the reception of this little one?" Beatrix nodded. "Peril of thy head, woman, if it were not," he added scornfully, and raised the top of the sedan, while his assistants respectfully withdrew. "Fair Lilian," said he, commencing one of his made-up fine speeches, but not without apparent confusion, "fair Lilian, and not less beloved than fair, pardon this duplicity, for which the excess of my love can be my only, my best excuse. My love--alas! my dear girl, you have known it long, and too long have you slighted it. But on bended knee, behold!--I beseech you to pardon me--Lilian--dearest Lilian----"

"Ha, ha! ho, ho!" laughed a deep and sonorous voice within the sedan. "Horns of Mahoud! if this is not exquisite!" and, instead of beholding Lilian's fair face, shaded by silken ringlets--lo! the exasperated lover was confronted by the bushy perriwig, swart visage, and black moustachios of Dick Douglas of Finland. "Ho, ho! your Lordship has been prodigiously outwitted;" and the cavalier laughed as if he would die.

"A thousand furies! draw! Finland, draw!--your life shall pay for this!" exclaimed Clermistonlee, recoiling and laying hand on his sword.

"As you please, Right Honourable; but I hope, most noble Lord, your rascals mean to carry me back to the city--ha, ha!"

"Not unless it be cold and stark upon a bier. Zounds! Sir, I believe you know I am one who will not brook being trifled with."

"Your Lordship must know me for the same," replied Finland, gravely. "I care not a straw what view you may take of this night's adventure, and will now, or at any time, render due satisfaction for it, with my sword, body to body. I am generally to be found either at my quarters in the White Horse Cellar, or in Hugh Blair's Coffeehouse."

"Or the Laird of Maxwelton's--ha!"

"Where your Lordship had better not present yourself; and so, gadzooks! your most obedient. Harkee! Mother Gilruth, undo the barrier; you know me, I think, old one, eh?" and he threw a few coins in her apron, saying, "I can be as free of my flesh and gold as either lord or loon."

Beatrix, whose grey eyes gleamed with malice and avarice, clutched the money with one hand, and shook a poniard at the donor with the other; while Clermistonlee, who was boiling with passion and mortification, again approached him. Douglas started, and half unsheathed his glittering rapier; while Juden, who considered his Lord's affront as one offered to himself, snatched an old partisan from the wall, and prepared to fall on.

"Hold! Juden--back!--not now--not now!" said his master, waving his hand.

"'Tis well, my Lord," said Douglas; "delay so long as you please. We expect to march southward shortly, and I would regret to be left behind with a slashed skin, when Dunbarton's drums were beating the point of war in the face of an enemy. Yes--by all the devils, I would wish rather to fall _à la coup de mousquet_, than by the rapier of Randal Clermont."

"Your wish may be frustrated if you speak thus insolently," replied Clermistonlee, who admired the cavalier's bearing, though exasperated by the trick he had played him. "But be it so, Finland. Were not this hand fettered by a longing for revenge--a longing which beyond the morrow I cannot control, and which compels me to retain my sword for the heart of another enemy, God wot, I would slay you where you stand. As a swordsman, you are aware I am unmatched in the three Lothians."

"Pshaw!--on the ramparts of Lisle, after three passes, I disarmed Monsieur de Martinet, of the Regiment du Roi; and he was the first swordsman in France and Flanders. I believe we are pretty equal. But, my Lord, he for whom you reserve your skill and fury is my friend--my friend is my second self; and I tell thee, Randal Clermont, Lord and Baron though ye be, that when I think of what might have been the fate of Lilian Napier under this accursed roof, and in the hands of thee and thy hell-doomed harridan, I am sorely tempted to have at thy throat."

"'Sdeath! these are words rarely addressed to Clermistonlee. Begone! sirrah, ere from high words we come to hard blows. Away! and remember that the time is not far distant when this night's prank shall be dearly atoned for."

"When that hour comes, Finland will never fail," replied the cavalier, throwing his broad beaver jauntily on one side, as with one hand on his rapier, and the other twirling his moustache, he strode away, singing--

"She is all the world to me, And for my blue-eyed Annie Laurie, I would lay me down and die."