Chapter IX: Part 9

"I think a single cradle wad do. It was a' that Mirren asked for," said Alick demurely; "but please yoursel', Mistress Fraser, it is you that kens."

"Yin," cried Mistress Fraser, "the man's gane gyte. Gin ye wull bring a family into the warld by squads o' regiments, ye maun e'en tak' the consequences. Lod, Lod, three cradles a' rockin' at the same time in yae hoose, it will be like a smiddy—or a watchmaker's shop! It'll be fine exerceese for ye, Alick, my man, when ye come hame at nichts—nae mair planting o' nasty-hurcheons and pollyanthies. But every foot on a cradle rocker, and the lassie's yin to pu' wi' a string. An' serve ya baith richt. O, the deceitfu' madam; wait till I get ower to the Sandyknowes!"

And Alick had to take his longest strides to keep pace with the anxious mother of eleven—to whom he had told no lie, though, as he afterwards said, he "had maybes keeped his thumb on some blauds o' the truth."

"It shows," said Alick, "what a differ there is atween the truth and the hale truth—specially when there's a reason annexed in the shape of a woman's imagination, that naturally rins on sic like things."

But as they neared Sandyknowes it is not to be doubted that Alick grew a little anxious. His position would not be exactly a pleasant one, if, for instance, Mirren should suddenly come out of their little byre with a full luggie of milk. And it was about milking time.

"There doesna appear to be muckle steer aboot the place, for siccan an awfu' thing to hae happened so lately!" said Mistress Fraser.

"Na," said the arch-deceiver Alick, making a last effort, "we are tryin' to keep a' thing as quaite as possible."

"And faith, I dinna wonder. Gin the wives nooadays had ony spunk in them ava', ye wad be mobbed and ridden on the stang, my man!" Then her grievance against Mirren came again upon Mistress Fraser with renewed force, "O, the randy, the besom," she cried; "wait till I get her!"

By this time they were nearing the door of Sandyknowes.

"I dinna think I'll come ben wi' ye the noo. I'll gang ower by the barn instead. There's some things to look to there, I misdoubt," said Alick.

Just then they heard Mirren's voice raised in a merry laugh. It was really at the tale of Boy Hugh and Miss Briggs, which Vara was telling her.

But the sound brought a scared look to the face of Mistress Fraser.

"She's lauchin', I declare!" she cried; "that's an awesome bad sign. Guid kens hoo mony there may be by this time——"

And she fairly lifted her voluminous petticoats, and, with her bundles under her arm, ran helter-skelter for the door of Sandyknowes, more like a halfling lassie than a douce mother of eleven bairns.

Muckle Alick saw her fairly in at the kitchen door.

"I think I'll gang ower by to the barn," he said.

But he had not got more than half-way there when both leaves of the kitchen door sprang open, and out flew Mistress Fraser with the large wooden pot-stick or spurtle in her hand. Alick had admired her performance as she ran towards the house. But it was nothing to the speed with which she now bore down upon him.

"It was like the boat train coming doon by the Stroan, ten minutes ahint time, an' a director on board!" he said afterwards.

At the time Muckle Alick had too many things to think about, to say anything whatever. He ran towards the barn as fast as he could for the choking laughter which convulsed him. And behind him sped the avenger with the uplifted porridge spurtle, crying, "O ye muckle leein' deevil—ye blackguaird—ye cunnin' hound, let me catch ye——"

And by the cheek of the barn door catch him Mistress Fraser did. And then, immediately after, it was Muckle Alick who received the reward of iniquity. But Mirren stood in the doorway with little Gavin in her arms and Vara and Boy Hugh at either side, and laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks in twin parallel rills.

"Gie him his paiks, and soundly, Mistress Fraser; pink him weel. Hit him on the knuckles or on the elbows. Ye micht as weel hit Ben Gairn as try to hurt him by hitting him on the head!"

Alick was speechless with laughter, but Mistress Fraser exclaimed with each resounding stroke, "Twa laddies and a lassie! O ye vermin!—And me has sent to the Folds and the Cowdenslacks for twa cradles to mak' up the three. Ye hae made a bonny fule o' me. I'll never hear the last o' it till my dying day in this countryside. But, at ony rate, I take my piper's pay in ha'pence out o' your skin, my man Alick!"

ADVENTURE XLII.

MUCKLE ALICK CONSIDERS.

"Noo that the collyshangie's dune," quoth Mirren Douglas, "ye micht gie us a word o' advice what we should do wi' the bairns. But come oot by. They are a' to their beds doon the hoose. And we can be takin' a look at the blossoms as we gang."

"We are to plant cabbage here next year, Mistress Fraser says!" cried Muckle Alick.

"Havers!" said his wife. But Mistress Fraser gave Alick a look which said as plain as print, "Have you not had enough?"

"Heard ye what the name o' the puir wandering things might be?" asked Mistress Fraser.

"Aye," said Mirren, briskly, "I hae heard a' aboot it. Their name is Kavannah. Their faither gaed awa' to Liverpool a whilie since to seek wark. And the bairns has left their mither in Edinburgh to seek their faither. And I judge their mither is a gye ill yin."

"Did she tell ye that?" asked Muckle Alick, quickly.

"Na, but I jalloused it!"[5] said his wife.

"And hoo in the world could ye jallouse sic a thing as that?" said he.

"Just the way ye jallouse that the express is comin' when ye hear the whistle, and the signal draps to 'clear,' ye muckle nowt!" said his wife, taking what is known as a personal example.

"The lassie didna tell me yae single word, but the boy showed me an _arr_-mark on his temple. 'The awfu' woman did that!' says he.

"'And wha's the awfu' woman, my bonny man?' says I."

"The lassie tried to turn him, but he oot wi' it. 'It's just my mither!' says he. And if ye didna caa that a gye near signal, I ken na what is. It's as plain as findin' bits o' a dog collar in the sausage or a burn troot in the milk!"

But her husband did not laugh, as he usually did at her sayings. His own humour was not of that kind, but slow, ponderous, and deliberate.

"What are ye standin' there gapin' at?" demanded his wife.

Alick held up his hand. His wife knew that this was a signal that he wished to be left to think undisturbed a little longer. So she hurried Mistress Fraser along to look at what she called her "nasty-hurcheons." Sandy's mental machinery, like his bodily, was slow to set in motion, but it worked with great momentum when once it was set a-going.

Muckle Alick was putting two and two together.

"I ken a' aboot it," he said at length, when the process was complete. "We will need to be awesome careful. Thae bairns' faither never got to Liverpool; consequently it's little use them gaun there to seek him. He's either in his grave or the Edinburgh Infirmary. D'ye mind yon tramp man that gat the hurt in his head last spring, by hiding and sleepin' in the cattle waggons when they were shuntin'? His name was James Kavannah. I'se warrant he was the bairns' faither!"

Mirren Douglas gave Muckle Alick a bit clap on the shoulder.

"Whiles ye are nane so stupid, man," she said, "I believe ye are richt."

"And he was on his road to Liverpool, too," added Alick, "for when he was oot o' his mind he cried on aboot that a' the time. And aye the owerword o' his sang was, 'She'll no get me in Liverpool!'"

His wife looked at Alick. And Muckle Alick looked at Mirren.

"We'll keep them awhile, onyway, till they can get a better hame. The lassie will soon be braw and handy," said Mirren.

"I'm thinkin'," said Alick, "that the flower-beds will hae to come up after a', and we'll plant taties if the porridge pot shows signs o' wearin' empty."

It was thus that our three wanderers found a place of lodgment in the wilderness in the kindly house of Sandyknowes.

"There's my sister Margaret up at Loch Spellanderie," said Mistress Fraser; "she was tellin' me on Monday that she was wantin' a lass. She's no very easy to leeve wi', I ken. But she will gie a guid wage, and the lass would get an insicht into country wark there. It micht be worth while thinkin' aboot."

"It is kind o' ye to think o't," said Mirren, doubtfully.

"O," replied Mistress Fraser, "I'm nane so sure o' that. As I tell ye, oor Meg is nane o' the easiest to serve. But, as the guid Buik says, it's a good and siccar lesson for the young to bear the yoke in their youth."

"An' I'm sure thae puir bairns hae had their share o't," said Muckle Alick.

"I suppose," said Mistress Fraser, as she prepared to take her leave, "that ye canna keep your thumb on the joke aboot the twa laddies and a lassie. Na, it's no to be expected o' you, Mirren. It's ower guid a tale to tell, specially on me, that aye prided mysel' on letting naebody draw my leg. But ye did me to richts this time, ye great stirk—to bring me fleein' ower here wi' my coaties kilted as if I had the back-door trot, a' to see three newly-come-hame bairns, and the auldest o' them near woman muckle. And the loon that gaed me the cheat an elder o' the kirk! Sorrow till ye, Alick, but I could find it in my heart to clour your lugs even yet."

"Ye hae my richt guidwull," said Mirren, encouragingly.

But Muckle Alick only laughed. Then Tam Fraser came in seeking his wife.

"I hae been hearin' a' aboot your daft ploy, rinnin' in front o' the engine and gettin' dunted oot o' the road," said he. "Some folk was threepin' that it was awesome brave o' ye, but I think it was juist a daft, rackless triflin' wi' Providence. That's my thocht on't."

"What was that? I hae heard tell o' it for the first time," said Mirren. "But that's nae new thing in this hoose. Alick's married wife is aye the last to hear o' his daft-like doin's."

"O, nocht very special this time," said Tam Fraser. "He only threw a hundred and six Irish drovers oot o' a third story window ower the engine o' the Port express, but there's nae mair than ten o' them dead. And then he louped in front on an engine gaun at full speed and to draw some bairns frae below the wheels," said Tam Fraser, giving the local version, corrected to date.

"Is this true?" said his wife severely, fixing her eyes upon Alick with a curious expression in them.

"There's juist aboot as muckle truth in it as there is in maist Netherby stories for common, after they hae gotten ten minutes' start," said Muckle Alick.

"What is your version o't?" said his wife, never taking her eyes off her husband.

"O, it was naething to tell aboot," said Muckle Alick. "There was some drovers in a carriage where they had nae business, and they wadna come oot, till I gaed in to them—and then they cam' oot! And the wee laddie an' the bairn were comin' alang the line afore the engine. And Geordie couldna stop. So I gied them a bit yirk oot and gat a dunch in the back wi' the buffer."

Mirren took her husband by the rough velveteen coat-sleeve.

"My man!" she said, rubbing her cheek against it. "But what for did ye no tell me?"

"I was gaun to tell ye the morn's mornin'," said Alick. "There was nae harm dune, ye see, but yin o' my gallus buttons riven off an' the buffer of Geordie's engine smashed. I was gaun to tell ye in the mornin' aboot the button needing sewin' on."

"Did ye ever see siccan auld fules," said Tam Fraser, as he and his wife went home, "rubbin' her cheek again his airm, that's as thick as a pump theekit frae the frost wi' strae rapes?"

"Haud your tongue, Tam," said his wife, whose temper had suffered; "if I had a man like that I wad rub my cheek against his trouser leg, gin it pleasured him, the day by the length."

ADVENTURE XLIII.

TOWN KNIGHT AND COUNTRY KNIGHT.

Mr. Cleg Kelly awoke early on the day upon which he was to make the bold adventure of getting to Netherby Junction without enriching the railway company by the amount of his fare. But his conscience was clean; he was going to work his passage. It is true that neither the general manager nor yet the traffic inspector had been consulted in the matter. But for the sake of Cleg's friend (to be exact, Cleaver's boy's sweetheart's fellow-servant, cook at Bailie Holden's), Duncan Urquhart was willing (and he believed able) to engineer Cleg's passage to Netherby without fee or reward.

Duncan was friendly with the guard of his goods train, which is a thing not too common with those who have to run goods trains together, week in and week out. The shunting at night in particular is wearing to the temper, especially in the winter time, when it is mostly dark in an hour or two whenever your train happens to start.

"Can you stand there and turn a brake?" said Duncan to Cleg, setting him in a small compartment by himself; "screw her up whenever we are running downhill. Ye will ken when by the gurring and shaking."

Mr. Duncan Urquhart was a very different man during the day, to the gay and gallant evening caller who had won the easy-melted heart of the cook at Holden's—which a disappointed suitor once said bitterly was made of dripping. He was very grimy; he spoke but seldom, and then mostly in the highly imaginative and metaphorical language popular on the Greenock and South-Eastern. Duncan Urquhart, as has already been mentioned, was quite a first-class swearer, and had an originality not common among engineers, which he owed to his habit of translating literally from the Gaelic. Also, though he swore incessantly, he never defiled his mouth with profanity, but confined himself assiduously to personal abuse, which, if less sonorous, is infinitely more irritating to the swearee.

So hour after hour Cleg stood in the train and was hurled and shaken southwards towards Netherby. He helped at the shunting, coupling, and uncoupling with the best. For, from his ancient St. Leonards experience, he could run the coal-waggons to their lies as well as a professional. And though his occupations had been varied and desultory, Cleg was a born worker. He always saw merely the bit of work before him, and he set his teeth into it (as he said picturesquely) till he had clawed his way through.

Thus it was that Cleg found himself at Netherby Junction one Saturday night at six o'clock. It was the first time he had ever been further than the confines of the Queen's Park. And his vision of the country came to him as it were in one day. He saw teams driving afield. He saw the mowers in the swathes of hay. He watched with keen delight the grass fall cleanly before the scythe, and the point of the blade stand out at each stroke six inches from under the fallen sweep of dewy grass.

"Netherby Junction! Guidnicht!" said Duncan Urquhart, briefly. He had an appointment to keep with the provost's cook, who was also partial to well-bearded men with blue pilot-cloth jackets. Duncan would not have been in such a hurry, but for the fact that it took him half an hour to clean himself. He knew that half an hour when you go a-courting, and when the other fellow may get there first, is of prime importance.

Now, as Cleg Kelly stepped out upon the cattle-landing bank, he caught a glimpse of the biggest man he had ever seen, walking slowly along the white dusty road which led out of the passenger station. He was swinging his arms wide of his sides, as very big and broad men always do.

Cleg sped after him at top speed and took a tour round him before he spoke. The big man paid no attention, walking with his eyes fixed on the ground.

"Are ye the man that pitched oot the drovers?" said Cleg at last, coming to anchor in front of the giant.

Muckle Alick stopped in the road, as much surprised as though the town clock had spoken to him. For Cleg put a smartness and fire in his question to which the boys about Netherby were strangers.

"Where come ye frae?" he said to Cleg.

"I come from Edinburgh to see Vara Kavannah," said Cleg. "Is she biding wi' you?"

"She was, till yestreen," said Alick.

"And where is she noo?" said Cleg, buckling up his trousers.

"She is gane to serve at Loch Spellanderie by the Water o' Ae!" said Alick.

"And how far micht that be?" asked Cleg, finishing his preparations.

"Three mile and a bittock up that road!" said Muckle Alick, pointing with his finger to a well-made dusty road which went in the direction of the hills.

"Guidnicht!" cried Cleg, shortly. And was off at racing pace.

Muckle Alick watched him out of sight.

"That cowes a'!" he said, "to think that I could yince rin like that to see a lass. But the deil's in the loon. He's surely braw an early begun!"

Then Muckle Alick went round and told his wife.

"It will be the laddie frae Enbra that got them the wark in the mill, and gied up his wood hut to the bairns to leeve in. What for did ye no bring him to see Hugh Boy and the bairn?"

"I dinna ken that he gied me the chance," said Alick. "He was aff like a shot to Loch Spellanderie. I wad gie a shilling to hear what Mistress McWalter will say to him when he gets there. I houp that it'll no make her unkind to the lassie! If it does, I'll speak to her man. And at the warst she can aye come back to us. At a pinch we could be doing without her wage!"

"Aweel," said his wife, "the loon will be near there by this time."

And the loon was.

Cleg was just turning up over the hill road towards Loch Spellanderie, when he heard that most heartsome sound to the ear of a country boy—the clatter of the pasture bars when the kye are coming home. It is a sound thrilling with reminiscences of dewy eves, or heartsome lowsing times, of forenichts with the lasses, and of all that to a country lad makes life worth living.

But to Cleg the rattle of the bars meant none of these things. Two people were standing by the gate—a boy and a girl. Cleg thought he would ask them if this was the right road to Loch Spellanderie.

But as he came nearer he saw that the girl was Vara herself. She was in close and, apparently, very friendly talk with a stranger—a tall lad with a face like one of the white statues in the museum, at which Cleg had often peeped wonderingly on free days when it was cold or raining outside.

"Vara!" cried Cleg, leaping forward towards his friend.

"Cleg! What are you doing here?" said Vara Kavannah, holding out her hand.

But there was something in her manner that froze Cleg. He had come with a glowing heart. He had overcome difficulties. And now she did not seem much more glad to see him than she had been to talk with this young interloper at the gate of the field.

"This is Kit Kennedy," said Vara, with a feeling that she must by her tactfulness carry off an awkward situation.

"O it is, is it?" said Cleg, ungraciously.

Vara went on hastily to tell Cleg about the children—how well and how happy they were, how Gavin was twice the weight he had been, how Hugh Boy ran down the road each night to meet Muckle Alick, and how she was now able to keep herself, besides helping a little to support Hugh and Gavin also.

Cleg stood sulkily scraping the earth with the toe of his boot. Kit Kennedy left them together, and was going off with the cows towards the byre. He had seen a tall, gaunt woman, who was not to be trifled with, walking through the courtyard, and he knew it was time to take the kye in.

Vara stopped talking to Cleg somewhat quickly. For she also had seen Mistress McWalter. She walked away towards the farm. Cleg and Kit were left alone.

Quick as lightning Cleg thrust his arm before Kit Kennedy's face.

"Spit ower that!" he said.

Kit hesitated and turned away.

"I dinna want to fecht ye!" he said, for he knew what was meant.

"Ye are feared!" said Cleg, tauntingly.

Kit Kennedy executed the feat in hydraulics required of him.

"After kye time," said he, "at the back o' the barn."

Cleg nodded dourly.

"I'll learn ye to let my lass alane!" said the town boy.

"I dinna gie a button for your lass, or ony ither lass. Forbye there was nae ticket on her that I could see!" answered he of the country.

"Aweel," said Cleg; "then I'll warm ye for sayin' that ye wadna gie a button for her. I'm gaun to lick ye at ony rate."

"To fecht me, ye mean?" said Kit Kennedy, quietly.

Thus was gage of battle offered and accepted betwixt Cleg Kelly and Kit Kennedy.

ADVENTURE XLIV.

CLEG RELAPSES INTO PAGANISM.

The lists of Ashby were closed. The heralds and pursuivants did their devoirs, and the trumpets rang out a haughty peal. Or at least to that effect, as followeth:

"Come on!" said Cleg Kelly.

"Come on yoursel'!" said Kit Kennedy.

"Ye're feared," cried the Knight of the City, making a hideous face.

"Wha's feared?" replied the Knight of the Country, his fists twirling like Catherine wheels. The boys slowly revolved round one another. It was like the solar system, only on a somewhat smaller scale. For first of all their fists revolved separately round each other, then each combatant revolved on his own axis, and lastly, very slowly and in a dignified manner, they revolved round one another.

All this happened in the cool of the evening, at the back of the barn at the farmhouse of Loch Spellanderie. It was after the kye had all been milked and Vara Kavannah was in the house clearing away the porridge dishes, while the mistress put the fretful children to bed with an accompanying chorus of scoldings, slappings, and wailings of the smitten.

As the lads stood stripped for fight Cleg was a little taller than Kit Kennedy, and he had all the experience which comes of many previous combats. But then he was not, like Kit Kennedy, thrice armed, in the consciousness of the justice of his quarrel.

"Come on," cried Cleg again, working up his temperature to flash point, "ye gawky, ill-jointed, bullock-headed, slack-twisted clod-thumper, ye! See gin I canna knock the conceit oot o' ye in a hop, skip, and jump! I hae come frae Edinburgh to do it. I'll learn you to tak' up wi' my lass! Come on, ye puir Cripple-Dick!"

And at that precise moment Kit Kennedy, after many invitations, very suddenly did come on. Cleg, whose passion blinded him to his own hurt, happened to be leaning rather far forward. It is customary in the giving of "dares" round about the Sooth Back, for the threatener to stick his head as far forward as he can and shake it rapidly up and down in a ferocious and menacing manner. This ought to continue, according to the rules, for fully ten minutes, after which the proceedings may commence or not according to circumstances. But Kit Kennedy, farm assistant to Mistress McWalter of Loch Spellanderie, was an ignorant boy. He had had few advantages. He did not even know the rules appertaining to personal combats, nor when exactly was the correct time to accept an invitation and "come on."

So that was the reason why Cleg Kelly's left eye came unexpectedly in violent contact with Kit's knuckles. These were as hard with rough labour as a bullock's hind leg.

The sudden sting of the pain had the effect of making Cleg still more vehemently angry. "I'll learn you," he shouted, "ye sufferin', shairny blastie o' the byres, to strike afore a man's ready. You fecht! Ye can nae mair fecht than a Portobello bobbie! Wait till I hae dune wi' ye, my man. There'll no be as muckle left o' ye as wad make cat-meat to a week-auld kittlin'. What for can ye no fecht fair?"

Our hero's cause was so bad, and his lapse into heathenism became at this point so pronounced, that for the sake of all that has been we decline to report the remainder of his speech.

But Kit Kennedy did not wait on any further preliminaries.

_Ding-dong!_ went his fists, one on Cleg's other eye and the other squarely on his chest. Cleg was speaking at the time, and the latter blow (as he afterwards said) fairly took the words from him and made him "roop" like a hen trying to crow like a cock.

At this terrible breach of all laws made and promulgated for the proper conduct of pitched battles, what remained of Cleg's temper suddenly gave way. He rushed at Kit Kennedy, striking at him as hard as he could, without the slightest regard to science. But Kit Kennedy was staunch, and did not yield an inch. Never had the barn end of Loch Spellanderie witnessed such a combat. Cleg, on his part, interpolated constant remarks of a disparaging kind, such as "Tak' that, ye seefer!" "That'll do for ye!" But Kit Kennedy, on the other hand, fought silently. The most notable thing, however, about the combat was that in the struggle neither of the knights took the slightest pains to ward off the other's blows. They were entirely engrossed in getting in their own.

The dust flew bravely from their jackets, until the noise resembled the quick, irregular beating of carpets more than anything else. But, after all, not very much harm was done, and their clothes could hardly have been damaged by half a dozen Waterloos. It was like to be a drawn battle, for neither combatant would give in. All Cleg's activity and waspishness was met and held by the country boy with dogged persistency and massive rustic strength. Cleg was lissom as a willow wand, Kit tough and sturdy as an oak bough. And if Cleg avoided the most blows, he felt more severely those which did get home.

Thus, not unequally, the battle raged, till the noise of it passed all restraint. John McWalter of Loch Spellanderie was making his evening rounds. As he went into the barn he heard a tremendous disturbance at the back among his last year's corn-stacks. He listened eagerly, standing on one foot to do it. The riot was exceedingly mysterious. Very cautiously he opened the top half of the barn door and peered through. It might be an ill-set tinker come to steal corn. John McWalter had Tweed and Tyke with him, and they frisked their tails and gave each a little muffled bark to intimate that they should much like to join in the fray.

John McWalter was not used to facing difficult positions on his own responsibility, so quite as cautiously he slipped back again through the barn, and crossed the yard to the house.

His wife was actively engaged scolding Vara for wasting too much hot water in cleaning the supper bowls. This happened every evening, and Vara did not greatly mind. It saved her from being faulted for something new.

"Ye lazy, guid-for-naething!" Mrs. McWalter was saying, "I wonder what for my daft sister at Netherby sent a useless, handless, upsetting monkey like you to a decent house—a besom that will neither work nor yet learn——"

At this moment John McWalter put his head within the door.

"There's twa ill-set loons killin' yin anither ahint the barn!" he said.

"What's that gotten to do wi' it, guidman," replied his wife. "Guid life! Ye cry in that sudden I thought it was twa o' the kye hornin' yin anither. But what care I for loons? Juist e'en let them kill yin anither. There ower great plenty o' them aboot Loch Spellanderie at ony rate! Ill plants o' a graceless stock. Never was a McWalter yet worth his brose!"

"But," said her husband, "it's Kit Kennedy fechtin' wi' a stranger loon that I never saw afore! And I dinna believe he has foddered the horse!"

Mistress McWalter snatched up the poker.

"Him," she cried, "the idle, regairdless hound, what can the like o' him be thinkin' aboot? I'll learn him. Gin he gets himsel' killed fechting wi' tinklers for his ain pleesure, wha is to look the sheep and bring in the kye in the mornin'? And the morn kirnin' day too!"

So in the interests of the coming hour at which the week's cream was to be churned into butter, and from no regard whatever for her nephew's life or limb, the mistress of Loch Spellanderie hasted out to interfere in the deadly struggle. But Vara Kavannah was before her. She flew out of the kitchen door, and ran round the house. The McWalters followed as best they could, her mistress calling vainly on her to go back and wash the dishes.

When Vara turned the corner, Cleg and Kit were still pelting at it without the least sign of abating interest. Cleg was now darting hither and thither, and getting in a blow wherever he could. Kit was standing doggedly firm, only wheeling on his legs as on a pivot, far enough to meet the town boy's rushes. It was a beautiful combat, and the equality of it had very nearly knocked all the ill-nature out of them. Respect for each other was growing up in their several bosoms, and if only they could have stopped simultaneously they would have been glad enough to shake hands.

So when Vara came flying round the corner and ran between them, the boys were quite willing to be separated, indeed even thankful.

"Run, quick!" she cried to Cleg, "they are comin'. O haste ye fast!"

But Cleg did not know any respect for the powers that be. He knew that the ordinary bobby of commerce did not dwell in the country. And besides, even if he did, the lad who could race red-headed Finnigan, the champion runner of the Edinburgh force, and who had proved himself without disgrace against the fastest fire engine in the city, was not likely to be caught, even in spite of the fact that he had run all the way from Netherby Junction that night already.

So Cleg turned a deaf ear to Vara's entreaties, and, very simply and like a hero, wiped his face with the tail of his coat.

Kit Kennedy also kept his place, a fact which deserves recognition. For he, on his part, faced a peril long known and noted. The mystery of unknown and unproven danger did not fascinate him.

In a moment more Mistress McWalter, a tall, masculine woman, with untidy hair of frosty blue-black, came tearing round the corner, while at the same time out of the back barn door issued John McWalter, armed with a pitchfork, and followed by Tweed and Tyke, the clamourous shepherding dogs of Loch Spellanderie.

Cleg found his position completely turned, and he himself beset on all sides. For behind him the Loch lay black and deep. And in front the wall of the barn fairly shut him in between his enemies. Mistress McWalter dealt Kit Kennedy a blow with the poker upon his shoulder as she passed. But this was simply, as it were, a payment on account, for _his_ final settlement could be deferred. Then, never pausing once in her stride, she rushed towards Cleg Kelly. But she did not know the manifold wiles of a trained athlete of the Sooth Back. For this kind of irregular guerilla warfare was even more in Cleg's way than a plain, hammer-and-tongs, knockdown fight.

As she came with the poker stiffly uplifted against the evening sky, Mistress McWalter looked exceeding martial. But, as Cleg afterwards expressed it, "A woman shouldna try to fecht. She's far ower flappy aboot the legs wi' goons and petticoats." Swift as a duck diving, Cleg fell flat before her, and Mistress McWalter suddenly spread all her length on the ground. Cleg instantly was on his feet again. Had the enemy been a man, Cleg would have danced on him. But since (and it was a pity) it was a woman, Cleg only looked about for an avenue of escape.

Kit Kennedy pointed with his finger an open way round the milkhouse. And Cleg knew that the information was a friendly enough lead. He had no doubts as to the good faith of so sturdy a fighter as Kit Kennedy. He was obviously not the stuff that traitors are made of.

But a sudden thought of inconceivable grandeur flushed Cleg's cheek. Once for all, he would show them what he could do. He would evade his pursuers, make his late adversary burst with envy, and wring the heart of Vara Kavannah, all by one incomparable act of daring. So he stood still till Mistress McWalter arose again to her feet and charged upon him with a perfect scream of anger. At the same time John McWalter closed in upon the other side with his hay-fork and his dogs. Cleg allowed them to approach till they were almost within striking distance of him. Then, without giving himself a moment for reflection, he wheeled about on his heels, balanced a moment on the brink, bent his arms with the fingers touching into a beautiful bow, and sprang far out into the black water.

So suddenly was this done that the good man of Loch Spellanderie, approaching with his hay-fork from one direction, ran hastily into the arms of his spouse charging from the other. And from her he received a most unwifely ring on the side of the head with the poker, which loosened every tooth John McWalter still retained in his jawbones.

"Tak' that, ye donnert auld deevil, for lettin' him by!" cried the harridan.

"Ye let him by yoursel', guidwife," cried her husband, who did not often resent anything which his wife might do, but who felt that he must draw the line at having to welcome the poker on the side of his head. "Dinna come that road again, my woman. I declare to peace; had it no been for the hay-time comin' on, and few hands to win it, I wad hae stuck the fork brave and firmly intil ye, ye randy besom!"

To what lengths the quarrel would have gone if it had been allowed to proceed, will never be known. For just at that moment the head of Cleg emerged far out upon the dark waters of Loch Spellanderie.

Cleg Kelly swam nearly as easily in his clothes as without them. For he had cast his coat at the beginning of the fray, and as to his trousers, they were loose and especially well ventilated. So that the water gushed in and out of the holes as he swam, much as though they had been the gills of a fish. Indeed, they rather helped his progress than otherwise.

Then from the dusky breadths of the lake arose the voice, mocking and bitter, of the Thersites of the Sooth Back, equally well equipped for compliment and deadly in debate.

"Loup in," he cried, "try a dook. It is fine and caller in here the nicht. But leave the poker ahint ye. It will tak' ye a' your time to keep your ain thick heid abune the water. Come on, you!" he cried pointedly to Mistress McWalter. "That face o' yours hasna seen water for a month, I'll wager. A soom will do you a' the guid in the world! And you, ye guano-sack on stilts, come and try a spar oot here. I'll learn ye to stick hay-fows into decent folk!"

But neither John McWalter nor yet his wife had a word to say in answer.

Then began such an exhibition as Loch Spellanderie had never seen. Cleg trod water. He dived. He swam on his back, on his side, on his breast. His arms described dignified alternate circles—half in air and half in water. He pretended to be drowning and let himself, after a terror-striking outcry, sink slowly down into deep water, from which presently he arose laughing.

And all the time his heart was hot and prideful within him.

"I'll learn her," he said over and over to himself, "I'll learn her to tak' up wi' a country Jock."

And then he would execute another foolhardy prank, dismally rejoicing the while in Vara's manifest terror.

"Cleg, come oot! Ye'll be drooned!" Vara cried, wringing her hands in agony. Simple and innocent herself, she could not understand why her kind good Cleg should act so. She had no conception of the evil spirit of pride and vainglory, which upon occasion rent and tormented that small pagan bosom.

"I'll show her!" remained the refrain of all Cleg's meditations for many a day.

Finally, when this had gone on for a quarter of an hour, Cleg trod water long enough to kiss his hand, and cry "Guidnicht!" to Mistress McWalter and her husband, who meanwhile stood dumb and astonished on the bank.

Then he turned and swam steadily away across the loch. He did not know in the least how he would get his clothes dried, nor yet where he would have to sleep. But his many adventures that day, and in especial the way he had "taken the shine oot o' that loonie wi' the curls," warmed and comforted him more than a brand new suit of dry clothes. So long as he could see them he looked over his shoulder occasionally. And when he noted the four dark figures still standing on the bank, Cleg chuckled to himself and his proud heart rejoiced within him.

"I telled ye I wad show her," he said to himself, "and I hae shown her!"

ADVENTURE XLV.

THE CABIN ON THE SUMMIT.

Like most Scottish lakes, Loch Spellanderie is not wide, and Cleg manfully ploughed his way across without fear of the result. For he had often swam much further at the piers of Leith and Trinity, as well as much longer in the many lochs which are girt like a girdle of jewels round about his native city. But presently his clothes began to tire him, and long ere the dark line of the trees on the further side approached, he was longing to be on shore again.

Sometimes also he seemed to hear the voices of men before him, though, owing the deep shadow of the trees, he could see no one. Cleg's arms began to ache terribly, and his feet to drag lower and lower. The power went out of his strokes. He called out lustily for the men to wait for him. He could hear something like a boat moving along the edge of the reeds, rustling through them with a sough as it went.

Suddenly Cleg saw something dark swimming slowly along the surface of the water. He struck towards it fearlessly. It was a piece of wood moved, as it seemed, by some mysterious power from the shore. Cleg called out again for the men whose voices he had heard to wait for him. But, instead of waiting, they promptly turned and fled. Cleg could hear them crashing like bullocks through the briars and hazels of the underbrush.

However, he was not far from the land now, and in a minute more he felt his feet rest upon the shelving gravel of the lake shore. Cleg brought the wedge-shaped piece of wood with him. He found upon holding it close to his eyes in the dim light, that a double row of hooks was attached to it beneath, and that there were half a dozen good trout leaping and squirming upon different sides of it.

Cleg had no notion of the nature of the instrument he had captured. Nor indeed had he the least idea that he had disturbed certain very honest men in a wholly illegal operation.

He only shook himself like a water-dog and proceeded to run through the wood at an easy trot, for the purpose of getting some heat back into his chilled limbs.

As he ran his thoughts returned often to Loch Spellanderie, and each time he cracked his thumbs with glee.

"I showed her, I'm thinkin'!" he said aloud.

Suddenly Cleg found himself out of the wood. He came upon a slight fence of wire hung upon cloven undressed posts, over which ran the shallow trench of the railway to Port Andrew.

Cleg knew himself on sure ground again so soon as he came to something so familiar as the four-foot way. He felt as if he had a friend in each telegraph post, and that the shining perspective of the parallel metals stretched on and on into direct connection with Princes Street Station and the North Bridge tram lines which ran almost to the Canongate Head. He was, as it were, at home.

The boy hesitated a little which way to turn. But ultimately he decided that he would take the left hand. So Cleg sped along the permanent way towards Port Andrew at the rate of six miles an hour.

Had he known it, he was running as fast as he could out of all civilisation. For at this point the railway passes into a purely pastoral region of sheep and muircocks, where even farms and cot-houses are scarcer than in any other part of the lowlands of Scotland.

Nevertheless Cleg kept up the steady swinging trot, which had come to him by nature in direct descent from Tim Kelly, the Irish harvestman and burglar who in his day had trotted so disastrously into Isbel Beattie's life.

But Cleg was not to lie homeless and houseless that night, as Vara and the children had often done. Cleg possessed all a cat's faculty for falling on his feet.

At a lonely place on the side of the line he came upon a little cluster of tanks and offices, which was yet not a station. There was, in fact, no platform at all. It consisted mainly of the little tank for watering the engine, and, set deep under an overhanging snout of heathery moorland, an old narrow-windowed railway carriage raised upon wooden uprights.

Cleg stood petrified with astonishment before this strange encampment. For there were lights in the windows, and the sound of voices came cheerfully from within. Yet here was the lonely moor, with the birds calling weirdly all about him, and only the parallel bars of the four-foot way starting out east and west into the darkness, from the broad stream of comfortable light which fell across them from the windows of the wheelless railway carriage.

Finally Cleg plucked up heart to knock. He had a feeling that nothing far amiss could happen to him, so near a railway which led at long and last to Princes Street, where even at that moment so many of his friends were busily engaged selling the evening papers. Besides which he was in still nearer connection with his friends Muckle Alick, the porter, and Duncan Urquhart, the goods enginedriver at Netherby Junction.

Cleg tapped gently, but there was at first no cessation in the noise. He knocked a second time a little harder; still it was without effect.

A voice within took up a rollicking tune, and the words came rantingly through the wooden partition. Cleg's hand slid down till it rested upon the stirrup-shaped brass handle of a railway carriage. It turned readily in his fingers, and Cleg peered curiously within.

He could now see the singer, who sat on a wooden chair with his stocking-soles cocked up on the little stove which filled all one end of the hut. There came from within a delightful smell of broiling bacon ham, which hungry Cleg sniffed up with gusto.

The singer was a rough-haired, black-bearded man with a wide chest and mighty shoulders, even though he could not be called a giant when compared with Muckle Alick down at Netherby. And this is what he sang:

Auld Granny Grey Pow,
Fetch the bairnies in;
Bring them frae the Scaur Heid,
Whaur they mak' sic din.
Chase them frae the washin' pool,
Thrang at skippin' stanes—

_Auld Granny Grey Pow,
Gather hame the weans._

The singer's voice sang this verse of the Poet of the Iron Road[6] so gaily that Cleg felt that his quarters for the night were assured. He was about to step within when a new voice spoke.

"'Deed and it micht serve ye better a deal, Poet Jock, gin ye wad set doon your feet and lift your Bible to tak' a lesson to yoursel', instead o' rantin' there at a gilravage o' vain sangs—aye, even wastin' your precious time in makkin' them, when ye micht be either readin' the Company's rules or thinkin' aboot the concerns o' your never-dying sowl!"

"You haud your tongue, Auld Chairlie," cried the singer, pausing a moment, but not turning round; "gin ye hadna missed thae troots the nicht and lost your otter to the keepers in Loch Spellanderie, ye wadna hae been sitting there busy wi' Second Chronicles!"

And again the singer took up his ranting melody:

Bring in Rab to get him washed,
Weel I ken the loon,
Canna do unless he be
Dirt frae fit to croon.
Tam and Wull are juist the same
For a' I tak' sic pains—

_Auld Granny Grey Pow,
Gather hame the weans._

So the singer sang, and ever as he came to the refrain he cuddled an imaginary fiddle under his chin and played it brisk and tauntingly like a spring:

_Auld Granny Grey Pow,
Gather hame the weans._

Then, before another word could be spoken, Cleg stepped inside.

"Guidnicht to ye a'!" he said politely.

The man who had been called Poet Jock took down his feet from the top of the stove so quickly that the legs of the chair slipped from under him, and he came down upon the floor of the carriage with a resounding thump. Auld Chairlie, a white-haired old man who sat under a lamp with a large book on his knee, also stood up so suddenly that the volume slipped to the floor.

"O mercy! Lord, preserve me, what's this?" he cried, his teeth chattering in his head as he spoke.

"Wha may you be and what do ye want?" asked poet Sandy, without, however, getting up from the floor.

"I'm juist Cleg Kelly frae the Sooth Back," said the apparition.

"And whaur got ye that otter and troots?" broke in Auld Chairlie, who could not take his eyes off them.

"I got them in the loch. Did ye think they grew in the field, man?" retorted Cleg, whose natural man was rising within him at the enforced catechism.

"Preserve us a'—I thocht ye had been either the deil or a gamekeeper!" said Auld Chairlie, with intense earnestness; "weel, I'm awesome glad ye are no a game watcher, at ony rate. We micht maybe hae managed to gie the deil a bit fley by haudin' the muckle Bible to his e'e. But gamekeepers are a' juist regairdless heathen loons that care neither for Kirk nor minister—except maybe an orra while at election time."

"Aye, man, an' ye are Cleg Kelly? Where did ye 'Cleg' frae?" asked the poet, who contented himself jovially with his position in the corner of the floor, till a few cinders fell from the stove and made him leap to his feet with an alacrity which was quite astounding in so big a man. Then the reason why he had been content to sit still became manifest. For his head struck the roof of the little carriage with a bang which made him cower. Whereupon he sat down again, rubbing it ruefully, muttering to himself, "There maun be the maist part o' an octavo volume o' poems stuck to that roof already, and there gangs anither epic!"

When the Poet and Auld Chairlie had re-composed themselves in the little hut, Cleg proceeded to tell them all his adventures, and especially all those which concerned Mistress McWalter of Loch Spellanderie, and the great swim across the water.

ADVENTURE XLVI.

A CHILD OF THE DEVIL.

"We'll e'en hae yon trouts to our suppers yet!" said Poet Jock. "Chairlie, man, pit on the pan. It's wonderfu' the works o' a gracious Providence!"

And so in a trice the two noble loch trouts were frying with a pat of butter and some oatmeal in the pan, and sending up a smell which mingled deliciously enough with that of the fried ham which already smoked upon an aschet by the fireside.

The good-hearted surfacemen at the Summit Hut seemed to take it for granted that Cleg was to remain with them. At least neither of them asked him any further questions. This might be because in the course of his story he had mentioned familiarly the name of Duncan Urquhart the goods guard, and the still greater one of Muckle Alick, the head porter at Netherby. And these to a railway man on the Port Road were as good as half-a-dozen certificates of character.

What a night it was in that wild place! The poet chanted his lays between alternate mouthfuls of ham and fried scones of heavenly toothsomeness. Auld Chairlie said quite a lengthy prayer by way of asking a blessing. And the supplication would have continued a longer time still, but for Poet Jock's base trick of rattling a knife and fork on a plate, which caused Auld Chairlie to come to an abrupt stoppage lest any unsportsmanlike march should be stolen upon him.

Finally, however, all started fair.

"I wadna' wonder gin thae troots were poached!" said the poet, winking slily at Cleg; "ye wadna' believe what a set o' ill-contrivin' fallows there are in this countryside!"

"As for me," said Auld Chairlie, "I can see naething wrang in catchin' the bit things. Ye see it's no only allowed, it's commanded. Did ye never read how the birds in the air and the fishes in the flood were committed too or faither Aaidam to tell the names o' them? Noo, unless he gruppit them, how could he possibly tell their names? The thing's clean ridiculous!"

"Mony a decent man has gotten sixty days for believin' that!" cried the poet between the mouthfuls.

In the middle of the meal the poet leaped up suddenly, checking himself, however, in the middle of his spring with a quick remembrance of the roof above him. "Preserve us, laddie, ye are a' wat!"

"So would you," quoth Cleg, who in the congenial atmosphere of the cabin had recovered all his natural briskness, "gin ye had soomed Loch Spellanderie as weel as me! Even a pairish minister wad be wat then!"

"Aye," said Auld Chairlie, sententiously, "that's juist like your poet. He hears ye tell a' aboot soomin' a loch. But he never thinks that ye wad hae to wat your claes when ye did it."

"But ye didna' speak aboot it ony mair than me, Auld Chairlie!" retorted Poet Jock.

"An' what for should I do that? I thocht the laddie maybe prefer't to 'bide wat!" said Auld Chairlie, with emphasis.

"Ye are surely growin' doited, Chairles," said the poet; "ye took the Netherby clearin' hoose clerk for the General Manager o' the line the day afore yesterday!"

"An' so micht onybody," replied Auld Chairlie, "upsetting blastie that he is! Sic a wame as the craitur cairries, wag-waggin' afore him. I declare I thocht he wad be either General Manager o' the line or the Provist o' Glescae!"

"Haud your tongue, man Chairlie, and see if ye can own up, for yince! If we are to judge folk by their wames, gussy pig gruntin' in the trough wad be king o' men. But stop your haverin' and see if ye hae ony dry claes that ye can lend this boy. He'll get his death o' cauld if he lets them dry on him."

But Auld Chairlie had nothing whatever in the way of change, except a checked red-and-white Sunday handkerchief for the neck.

"And I hae nocht ava'!" exclaimed the poet. "Ye maun juist gang to your bed, my man, and I'll feed ye over the edge wi' a fork!"