Front matter (continued 4)

Then was my heart full of disgust that I should find her whom I had loved and worshipped engaging in another midnight tryst, and one that might be no better than a paltry intrigue.

So angered was I that I stole to the door, meaning to break out upon them in violent speech, caring little in mine anger what should happen. But as I came to the edge of the hard-beaten threshing-floor, Marjorie Kennedy came to the door swiftly. Turning in front of the barn, and standing with the shawl thrown back from her head, she spoke to the man she had left, whom as yet I saw not.

'Remember,' she said, 'I promise no more than the bare fact. I tell you I choose the grave before a bride-bed, the worm before such a husband!'

But the man to whom she spoke uttered no word, though he had come nearer to where in the dusk of the doorway I stood with my sword bare in my hand. I could see him plainly now—all but his face, for the tide of darkness was on the ebb. He was the tall, cloaked man whom we knew as the Grey Man.

Behind him, at the angle of the wall, crouched a black mass which yet was human—because, even as I looked, it took something from under a coat, and rose erect beside the Grey Man. As Marjorie vanished these two figures moved towards my hiding-place in the barn. I had no time to do more than glide within, pull a sheaf or two from the mow, and thrust myself, like a sword into its scabbard, within the hole I had made amid the piled grain.

Even as I looked, their dark figures filled up the square of greyness which the open barn door made against the snow. I saw them enter, feeling with their hands, as though to grasp something, yet not making any light to guide them in finding it.

Then indeed I was disquieted, and my very bones became as water within me. For if there is anything trying to the flesh of mortal man, it is to lie still and be groped for in the dark by unknown and horrible enemies. I had a nightmare sense of powerlessness to move, of impotence in the face of peril. I knew that when the blind groping inhuman horror took me by the throat, I should not be able even to cry out. It was like a dream of fever made real.

A moment after I heard a man's voice speak in a fierce whisper.

'Ah, here it is! Give me your hand and put strength to it.'

Then in a moment, like the breaking of a dam, the fear quite went from me. They were but common-place robbers after all, and I a craven and a coward to lie still while my master's goods were being stolen before my eyes.

I leaped out upon them without waiting to think, for I was not feared of a dozen such.

'Hold!' I cried. 'Stand for your lives, gutter-thieves, or I will run you through!'

I stood in the doorway with my sword and dagger in hand, and as soon as I felt one come against the point of my blade, I let him have it with all my might, for it was not a time for half-measures. Then, though I heard the answering cry of wounding, there was no time for further action, for something came at me with a rush like a wild beast of the wood, and the snarl of the springing heather cat. Now there are many things that a lad of eighteen or nineteen may do—things of worth and daring—but he cannot stand against the weight of a strong and well-grown man when he leaps upon him. Therefore I cannot count it to my shame that now I was overcome and overborne. Once and again was I smitten, till I felt the iron, as it had been fire, strike me here and there. And though I felt no pain, there was something warm, which I divined to be my own blood, running down. Then I knew no more.

When I awoke I was in the Grieve's house, lying on a bed. Sir Thomas Kennedy, my master, and the Earl himself were bending over me. They had unclasped my hand, and now stood back in wonderment at what they found gripped in it.

'It is the key of the treasure chest of Kelwood—the key with my father, the King of Carrick's seal graven upon it! Where could the lad have gotten it?'

Yet of a certainty they had taken it out of my tightly-clenched hand, which had been fixed upon something ever since they found me on the barn threshing-floor, where I lay senseless in a pool of my own blood.

CHAPTER XX

THE SECRET OF THE CAIRD

It was, I can avouch, a strange experience for me to lie on my back in the Grieve's house all through the long days of spring and summer. Kate Allison and her mother were tirelessly kind. The Grieve himself generally set his head past the door as he went and came from his meals, crying mayhap something of the day—that 'it was warm,' or that it was 'a wat yin,' and thinking it the height of a jest to say to me, 'An' what kind o' weather hae ye below the blankets?' For with kindly-natured country folk a little jest goes a great way, and serveth as long without washing as a pair of English blankets.

Then in the forenoon Sir Thomas would come in from the castle, opening the hallan door and walking across the Grieve's kitchen as unceremoniously as he would have done in his own house.

'My lad, they have made a hand of you, but we will dowse them yet for that!' was one of his stated encouragements to me. 'Let me see the clours—hoot, man, they will never mar you on your marriage day!'

And so, kindly and smiling, he would pass out again, walking with his hands behind his back as far as I could see him along the arches of the woodland.

Then would Marjorie come to the door, and inquire for me of good Mistress Allison. But she never accepted of her hearty invite to remain—or, at least, to enter and see the invalid. Gently would she ask after my well-being, and being assured of it, as gently would she go her way—her fair face looking so white and sorrowful the while, that I was wae for her, and for the unkenned secrets of her heart into which God forbid that I should pry.

But that which cheered me most, I think, was the kindness and warm-heartedness showed me without stint, both by Nell Kennedy and Kate Allison. They were no longer flighty and sharp of tongue in speaking to me, but rather spoke freely and sat much in the kitchen, with the door of my room open so that I could see them, nipping and scarting at one another like kittens in their wantonness, which was a great diversion and encouragement to me on my weary bed. And there we had no little merriment, for Nell Kennedy would be saucy and miscall me for my laziness and sloth—also for my lack of appetite, which she called 'dainty and dorty,' meaning thereby that I wanted finer meats than they had to give me.

Also, though she was no maid for gossip, Nell would bring me all the clash of the castle-town and farm-town, all the talk that was gone over in the mill, while the thirlage men waited for their grist. Where she got it to tell me I cannot imagine, but it was all like sweet wine to me that could hear naught most of the day and night, but the birds singing without and Mistress Allison clattering wooden platters within.

Also (and that was the kindliest thing she could have done, and touched my heart most of all), she brought to me all my war-harness and accoutrements. My sword, which she had cleaned herself after the scuffle in the barn; the dagger I had dropped when I caught and clutched the key of the Kelwood treasure, wherever that had been gotten—the pistols; the fine new hackbutt which had just come from the town of Ayr, and which Sir Thomas had given me for mine own, as he would have given a child a toy.

'Give the bairn its plaiks, then,' said Nell, as she laid them on the bed. 'Would it love to play with them? Then it shall!'

She spoke in an enticing and babyish way that diverted me, and warmed me too, when I thought she had so much kindliness for me.

So I said, 'It is monstrously well done of you thus to divert me.'

'Hoots,' she said, 'see what else I have brought you.'

And with that she took from her pocket all the apparatus of cleaning my pieces and sword, besides the links and buckles of Dom Nicholas's harness and equipment, the sight of which put me in a fever to see him again. Never was anything kindlier done. Also, she brought me from her father's scanty library such books as she thought I might care to read; though, indeed, I read but little, never having been greatly given to lear—save, as it might be, books of songs, troll-catches, wits' recreations and such like.

But amongst others she brought me a French manual of fence, which gave me infinite pleasure. For with her help I could spell out the instructions, and the plates of positions I was fain to imitate with my two rapiers, till I had hacked and scarred all the four posts of the bed most grievously. And Mistress Allison declared that it was not safe for anyone to come within the outer door.

But one day my bed-fast practice-at-arms stood mine hostess in good stead, for which afterwards she gave me full thankfulness. It chanced on a certain noontide of heat that all were at the hayfield. Even Kate and Nell had gone to toss the hay, which is a pleasant thing to do in good company, but, i' faith, ill enough to think on as I lay tossing my weary body, and cursing the luck that tied me here in a dull room—vexed with heat, the weight of bedclothing, and the broad buzzing flies which would light on the corner of one's nose, each time that sleep was on the verge of flapping down silently with his black wings to bring a welcome shortening of the weary hours. Mistress Allison stole about the kitchen on bare, broad feet, flapping and slapping the flags with them as she carried her cakes to the girdle plate, or swung it from the cleek above the clear baking fire of brown peats. She thought me asleep, for I had cleaned all my arms till I could see myself sitting up in bed, with my pale face and towsed haystack of a head, in every square inch of them.

Kate had brought me that day a book called The Whole Duty of Pilgrims, but finding it full of religious reflections and not tales of the Crusaders as I had hoped, I laid it aside for the Sabbath day, as being more reverent and fitting.

All at once the outer door of the Grieve's house was thrown back on its hinges, and a great sturdy caird entered—mayhap an Egyptian sorner, or bold robber, such as were vexing the realm at the time, or perhaps only a common muddy rascal of the road.

'Mistress, I bid you good-day,' he said. 'I am hungry and would have meat!'

Plain and quite short he said it—even as I have written it down.

'In this Grieve's house of Culzean even gentry folk say "An it please you," and "By your leave!"' replied, with some indignation, the mistress of the dwelling.

'But then I will e'en help myself, without please or leave either,' cried the villain. And with that he opened a leathern wallet that he had slung over his shoulder, and began to thrust therein, not only the scones, but anything about the dresser and tables that his thievish fancy lit upon.

'Now, mistress,' said he; 'let me have any siller you have in the house, and a well-pleased kiss of your weel-faured moo' therewith, or else I must do my needs with you!'

And with that he opened a great gully knife, as though he would run at her. Mistress Allison cried out with a strange cry of woman's fear, which I who had been in battle never heard the like of before. Just at this moment I pushed the bedroom door open with the point of my toe, and sat there looking straight at the man, with a pistol bended in each hand, and both of them trained point blank on the rascal's heart.

I make bold to say that in all this realm of Scotland there was not any man so exceedingly astonished as this particular sturdy thief at that moment.

'Drop the knife, sirrah!' I commanded, as one that cries his orders in a battle.

And the knife rang obediently on the stone floor.

'Kick it into the corner with your foot— No, not with your hand.'

And reluctantly he kicked the knife away from him.

'Now, my excellent good man,' said I, 'sit you down and put your hands behind you. There and thus, be still where you are, quite in the middle of the floor and not elsewhere.'

So he sat him down, and, keeping my pistols dead upon him, I bade Mistress Allison tie his hands firmly with cord, and give him a settle to lean against. Thereafter I comforted him with stern philosophy.

I told him of his wandering and uncertain life. I showed him conclusively how that he went ever in danger of the hangman's whip, and that at the end there could only be awaiting for him a shameful death. I told him also that our overlord of Culzean had the power of pit and gallows, and that, on the return of the haymakers, he should be brought out—when in an hour there would be an end of all his misery upon the dule-tree, or tree of execution, which stands by the great gate and bears medlars at any season, but only for an hour at a time.

''Tis the most cruel and unjust treatment of poor, beset, far wandering men!' said the man on the floor. They were the first words he had spoken since he threw down his knife. I wondered he could speak so well.

'We have heard no complaints, so far,' I made answer, drily, for the man's former insolence stuck in my throat. And in especial the thought of what might have happened to mine hostess or the maids, had I not been there upon the bed with my weapons beside me. So I kept him in torment of mind for a space.

At last, as the afternoon ebbed away, and the hour of sundown and homecoming wore on, his anxiety waxed pitiful. He turned and twisted to free his hands, so that the only way I could quiet him was to lift a pistol and point it at him. But even that did not appear to soothe him for any length of time.

At last he raised his head.

'Master,' said he, sullenly, but speaking not that ill, 'ye have me, I grant, in the cleaving of a stick. Now I will tell you a thing you greatly desire to know. Will ye promise to let me go, and I will never meddle you more?'

'I do not mean that you should,' said I, 'nevertheless, what is the thing that you can tell me? And when I know, I shall judge its worth—on the honour of a gentleman.'

'I can tell you,' said he, 'where you will find the treasure of Kelwood!'

'What bald-crowned blethers!' I cried scornfully. 'Pray, how am I to know that you speak the truth? Ye may tell me that it is with the gold cup, at the end of the rainbow!'

'It is true,' said the man, 'I might lie to you; but I will not, for I need my life. It is sweet to me as yours to you.'

'How can such a life be sweet?' I asked, daffing with the man in my power—which was 'bad form,' as John Mure himself sayeth in his history of the troubles.

'It is not a time to argue,' said he, 'but my life is as pleasant as the trees that toss their branches, and as the free life of the forest.'

'Too free altogether,' said I, 'thus to come in and threaten the life and honour of a decent woman. We must have such freedom trussed and stretched on a tow rope.'

'I did but fright her,' said he, sullenly.

'That is as may be,' replied I, keeping my pistol trained for his left eye-hole, 'and in any case it will be all the same in two hours.'

'But,' said he, 'hear me concerning the treasure of Kelwood. Ye have conquest the key. I can tell you where the box itself is. For if I win clear this time, I must escape over seas from the vengeance of the Grey Man.'

'But you may lie even as you have stolen, and I fear me murdered also, for by your talk you are one of a murderous set.'

'Of the lying you must e'en take your chance—even as, after telling you, I must take my chance of your cutting my bonds and letting me go.'

'You have a gentleman's word,' I answered him.

'And how much is that worth in Carrick this day,' he said harshly and bitterly, 'even with a bond to back it?'

'Mine,' said I, with what dignity I could muster, 'is worth as much as truth itself'—which, I grant, was but a windy saying.

'I believe it, and I will trust it,' said he. 'The treasure of Kelwood is in the cave of Sawny Bean, on the seashore of Bennanbrack, over against the hill of Benerard.'

And not another word would he say.

So when Mistress Allison had locked herself in the milk-house, and advised me that the haymakers were in full sight, I caused my man to roll himself to the door of the bedroom. There with my sword I cut the bonds.

'Now,' said I, 'take the door sharply, without so much as going to the other side for your bundle or your knife, and then the woods are open to you and the world wide.'

'I thank you, master,' he said civilly. 'When you go for the treasure, I counsel you do not call on Sandy by your leasome lane.'

And with that caution he betook himself into the glades of the wood.

CHAPTER XXI

MINE ANCIENT SWEETHEART

After he was gone I cast about in my mind, and, for the life of me, I could not decide whether the fellow had been lying to me or not. It was indeed a thing to be wondered at, how this chance scoundrel should know (what I had thought known only to my Lord of Cassillis and my master) that after the fight in the barn I had carried away, clenched in my hand, the key of the treasure chest of Kelwood.

Now, as was natural after this encounter, the goodwife of the Grieve's house could not make enough of me. Indeed, if anything, she made too much of me, for, instead of suffering her daughter and Nell to entertain me as before, while she went about her work, she thought it her duty as soon as one of them came in and sat down, to leave that which she was about, and come and sit with us for company. Now Mistress Allison was a good woman and agreeable of her tongue, but I did not feel the necessity for this byordinar kindness.

Yet it was not easy to alter it. Then in the evenings came Robert Harburgh to see me. At first he came once a week while my wounds kept me weak and fretful. Then, as I grew better, he came twice. And when I was able to sit up, it came about that he would arrive every night and bide till bedtime—so that at last I was almost shamed to have him sitting there, and feared that he might be burdensome to Kate Allison and her mother.

For Robert Harburgh had but little to say, but he ever looked and proved kindly. Also he brought me many things from Maybole and elsewhere—oranges and wine that had been shipped to Irvine from foreign parts, neckerchiefs also for Kate and her mother. A quiet, down-looking fellow was Robert, something dull of the uptake, and with little to say for himself; but a most noble sworder, and wholly without care for his body when it came to the fighting.

Now it seems a strange thing that I, who had so long played the lover to Kate Allison, should be laid by the heels in her father's house, hearing the whip and frisk of her gown about the chambers all the day. And I still loved to hear it, for she was a bonny lass—and kind, kind to me. Also her eyes were pleasant, and had both mischief and tears in them—not like Nell Kennedy's, that held only mischief and scorn—save once, as it seemed to me, a little while when I was deadly fevered, and when Dr Low of Ayr, the Earl of Cassillis's own physician, ordered me herb-drinks, and shook his doting wiseacre's head over me like a most melancholious billy-goat. Then for a little Nell's eyes were quiet and sorrowful.

But it did not last. For by the time that I could get a scheme laid to take advantage of the gleam of kindness, she was again but mine own ill-set lassie-boy of a Nell, and we were throng at the sparring and quarrelling just as usual. But, as I say, Kate Allison was wondrously kind to me. Many a night when the weather was hot, and my wounds paining me as though they would break again open, would she sit by me with clear caller water from the spring, tirelessly changing the soft linen cloths. And when the drops of fever-sweat stood on my brow, she would touch them gently away, and lay her own cool cheek against my forehead. Ay, and when I put my hand up and drew down her face, she would kiss me right frankly upon the lips. Yet, as I judged, not quite as of old. But I thought it might be the illness that made the difference, for with being sick in body and feverish in mind, nothing tastes the same. And so I thought it might be also with kisses.

But after I had grown stronger, I shall ever mind me of one night when I got a horrid awakening. It was a quiet gloaming. Kate Allison and I had the house to ourselves—to which, speaking for myself, I did not wholly object. I lay stretched upon the long oaken settle, on cushions which Nell Kennedy had brought from the great house. Kate sat beside me on a stool and leaned an elbow on the oak's edge. She was unwontedly silent, and sometimes I touched her cheek lightly with my hand. It was a most pleasant night, and my mind was full of pity and consideration for her. I bethought me that, though doubtless I could have looked higher, I might do worse in time than think of settling down with a sweet and pleasant lass like Kate Allison. It was also touching to me that she should never have wavered from loving me, all the time that I had been forgetting her and thinking of others. But that, I said to myself, is the way of women.

We were silent a great while, with the silence that needs no speech, and my heart had grown melting and kindly to the young lass, even as it had been in old days. All of a sudden she spoke.

'Launce,' said she, 'I'm going to be married!'

She never moved her head off my shoulder, leaning with her elbow on the edge of the settle, and looking away from me out at the door. Neither did she draw her hand from mine, but rather settled it the more kindly, nestling it in my palm.

Yet anyone might have knocked me off the oaken settle with a straw.

'Married!' said I. 'Ay, Kate, lass, of course you are going to be married. 'Tis what you and I must come to. I assure you I oftentimes have been thinking about that. There are not the makings of an old maid about you!'

This I said and waited for the answer of her eyes, in order to laugh again and make my jest. But she did not look at me. I do not think she heard me.

'I am to be married on Thursday!' she said calmly.

'Kate Allison!' I said, trying to turn up her head that I might look into her eyes. I thought to see the make-believe in them. But as women know how to do, she evaded me without seeming to be conscious of it.

'Why, Kate Allison, sweetheart!' said I, 'how can I be ready by Thursday, laid here on my back, with only you to care for me?'

'I am to be married on Thursday to Robert Harburgh!' she said.

Then I drew my hand away, and sat as erect and stern as the settle and my sickness would let me, for it is hard to appear dignified and like a soldier, lying on a couch and wrapped in women's shawls.

'I am deceived!' cried I, 'mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, has betrayed me, coming to steal that which was dear to me when I lay most weak and weary.'

And I think I made as if to rise, for I had an idea that I must go and get my sword—though what for, I cannot now imagine. But Kate Allison gently put me back on the pillows, and sat down beside me, taking one of my hands again, laying it against her cheek, and drawing at the same time her stool nearer to me.

I tried to withdraw my hand from hers, but being weak she masterfully kept it, so that the tears sprang to my eyes for very helplessness and anger.

'You have played with me and deceived me, Kate Allison,' I cried, as soon as I could command my voice; 'you have forgotten the old days and all that we were to one another.'

Nevertheless Kate Allison never winced but let me say my say out. And by this I knew that the old days were gone indeed. She was mightily set in her mind.

'Launce,' she said gently, 'Launce, dear sweetheart, hearken—I am fond of you. No lass in Carrick but would like you for a lad and a lover, even for your very feults, which are what all may see.'

What she might have meant I have even yet no idea.

'Ye are perfect for a lad that comes courting, and I liked ye fine—ay, and like ye yet. But I saw lang syne that the lads that court best are not the men that marry best.'

'Women are all traitors!' said I, with indignation tingling through my body; 'they kiss and they forget. And then in a trice they go kiss another—'

'Ay,' replied Kate Allison, with a little more gravity, 'and I mean to have a short word with you on that very thing.'

She paused for a moment, and looked staidly and thoughtfully out of the window. I believed at nineteen that I wholly understood all women. But now I know that when I am twice that and more, the simplest seeming of them will be able to wrap me in her daidly-apron, and sell me in the market for green cabbage.

'Listen, Launce, my dear,' she said. 'I was but a Grieve's lass, and not unbonny of my face, so you courted me. You longed after kissing, being a heartsome lad with a way with you and a glint in your e'e. And so you kissed me, and in my youth and folly I said ye not nay. But you went over the hill to the Boreland and you kissed Grace, and you kissed the lass at the house of the Red Moss—and you thought that I would never know it. And more, you expected that none else should ever come near to kiss me. Ay, and would have waxed mightily indignant and flashed a brave sword had any dared, for that is the excellent way of the lads that come courting—but not at all the way of the men that wise women marry.'

I was mazed and confounded before her, but could not answer a word, for the thing was as true as if she had read my heart. Where had the young lass so learned the ways of men?

'Forgotten your kisses, Launce?' she went on. 'And what of them? I count kisses but as the X's and O's that bairns make on the flags with soft cam stone—gone when the game is over.'

'The home-coming from the fair at Maybole and the kisses that you and I then kissed,' said I, bitterly, 'were these X's or O's? I rede ye tell me!'

'Launce,' said Kate Allison, 'we dreamed a pleasant dream, you and I. We have awaked. It is a new day. We wash the night fantasies off our faces, and are ready to meet the morning with the sunshine in our eyes. Together we have sipped the cream. It is time to drink the milk. We have gathered the flowers—let us look to the fruit.'

'Kate,' said I, more kindly, 'when did you think all these things?'

For the lassie made me marvel with the aptness of her speech, and ashamed with her plain saying of things that I had hardly named within myself.

'Ah,' she said gently and wisely, 'the thoughts of a lass when a lad comes courting her, are more than she tells with her mouth. For many a kiss is honey-sweet on the lips, but bitter as gall in the heart. Yet so has it not been with yours and mine. We loved and we part, even as the way-gaun of the wind that kissed the apple blossom in the spring when the year was young and glad.'

She made to rise from her seat.

'I must go,' she said.

'To go meet Robert Harburgh and to kiss him. I thought I knew his whistle!' said I, with my heart raging angry and disconsolate in spite of her fine words, which I could not answer.

'Ay,' she said, rising and setting her lips tenderly to my brow, which I pettishly turned away, being weakly sullen, 'even so—to meet Robert Harburgh and to kiss him.'

And with that she passed to the door. She turned ere she went out to say a last word.

'And you, Launce, my lad, will also one day desire to leave kissing comfits and find abiding love. And you need not go far afield to look for it either.'

Thus I was left alone with a heaving heart. And I am not ashamed to say that I wept bitterly for poor Launce Kennedy, who had none to care for him in all the wide lone world, in which he was now so sore wounded and cast aside like an old shoe or a broken sword.

But even as I wept and pitied myself, Nell Kennedy danced in, merry as the morn, and brought a great spray of belated hawthorn to set in a dish of water to keep the room sweet.

And I declare I never knew the young lass look so winsome before.

CHAPTER XXII

A MARRIAGE MADE IN HELL

When Robert Harburgh came in to see me in the evening, I was chill enough in my reception; but since he was of a calm temper, though so great a sworder, I might just as well have embraced him, for all the difference it made to him.

'So,' I said, without giving him more than time to sit down—for all my days I must ever fly headlong at a thing and have done with it—'so you are going to marry Kate Allison?'

'She was proposing so,' said he, as calmly as when he had walked across the yard to the summer-house, with the hackbutt bullets splattering about him and the guns going crack-crack down the hedgerows, like the thumbs of a class of bairns when the dominie asks a question.

'So,' said I. 'And you were thinking, maybe, that that was the action of a friend when your comrade was laid by the heels?'

'I was thinking so,' said he, looking out of the window at the trees.

'Did you not know,' I cried, for I was angered beyond words, being weak, and taking ill with the cherry being thus snatched out of my mouth, 'did you not know that Kate Allison was my lass before she was yours? Did she not tell you that?' said I.

Now, had I been myself, I should not thus have told left-handed tales on a lass, even though I believed with some reason that she had deceived me.

'I was not deprived of the sight of my eyes,' said he, very quietly.

'And you mean by that—?' said I, trembling with anger.

'That I did not need telling that you had been courting the lass off and on for a year or twa, and that she took it not ill.'

'And, in spite of that, you made up to Kate Allison when I was lying sick unto death upon my bed?' I asked him bitterly.

'How long may you have kenned Kate Allison?' said Robert Harburgh to me in his turn.

'Six years or so,' said I.

'And did you ever, in all that time, ask her to marry you?' he inquired.

'No,' said I, not seeing what he was driving at.

'Then,' said Robert, very drily, 'I did, though I kenned her not six weeks. And I would not wonder,' he went on, as though deep in meditation, 'I would not wonder but that is the reason why she is going to marry me.'

So I turned over in bed, being deep in the sullens, and Robert Harburgh went away, saying only, 'Now ye are angry, Launcelot, but ye will find us both good friends, and blythe will we be to see you at the five-merk lands of Chitterlintie which my Lord Cassillis is setting to Kate and me.'

However, as things fell out, the wedding was not to be on the Thursday, nor yet for many Thursdays, for Robert was bidden ride with the Earl to the Inch, his new house in Galloway. Hither he went to set pressure on the country lairds, who were his feudal holders, to gar them pay the dues which he, Grab-siller John, thought had been too long overlooked by his forebears. As the business was likely to prove a troublesome one, he sent for Robert Harburgh to ride with him. So, without so much as stopping to dismount, for the message came when he had been on duty, Robert Harburgh rode away. And if you will believe it, he went without so much as kissing his sweetheart. He leaned down and shook hands with her! But as for me, I marvelled how she bore with that, for to my certain knowledge she liked the other not so ill.

Just as I was daily getting stronger, I received another shock which had, I think, even more effect on me than the other. One morning there came Sir Thomas down from the castle, and I could see that he was full to the teeth with news, for he walked with great confidence, and swung a little stick made of two twisted stems of ivy which I had given him, very quaint and curious.

'It is all done with now,' he said, as soon as ever he had gotten himself seated; 'there are to be no more ill times in Carrick, and kinsmen's blood shall not flow any more in the West. John Mure of Auchendrayne and I have settled it all between us. His son and apparent heir, James, is to marry to-morrow with my daughter.'

I stared at him, stunned and dumbfounded.

'Ay,' he said, 'it is short notice, but young folks, ye ken—and my daughter would not hear of a great wedding; only what was fitting and plain.'

'Your daughter?' I said, steadying myself, though my heart was like to break, for I thought all my friends were to leave me together.

'Ay, Marjorie,'said Sir Thomas, 'she is a quiet like lass and speaks little, but when I put the matter of the marriage to her, she said only, "If it will staunch the feud, I am ready to marry whomsoever you will—Sir Thomas Tode, gin you like!" But that was only her daffing, for, as we all know, Sir Thomas is married already. And even if he were not, marrying him would be neither here nor there in the matter of the Cassillis and Bargany feuds.'

For my good master never saw far into a whin bush all his days, though accounted by most to be a wise man.

On the morrow, which was the day of the ill-faured wedding, I put on my complete accoutrements for the first time. I had Dom Nicholas saddled, for I felt strong once more, and greatly desired to be away from the place. So I stood by the gate as the party from Auchendrayne came in, and saluted them, as was my duty. Then I was riding away alone down by the shore road, when I heard in the distance the sound as of an approaching cavalcade.

Bridles were jingling, stirrups clicking, and spearheads making points of light, while the white foam went blowing back from the hard-ridden horses. When they rode up, I saw that they were as trenchant a set of blades as ever a man might wish to set eyes on. And at the head of them rode young Gilbert Kennedy of Bargany.

So, not knowing whether they came in peace or war, I set myself upright on the back of Dom Nicholas, who was of so great freshness with kicking of his heels in the park, that he was ill to keep at the stand. Nevertheless, stand I did in the midst of the outer gate, so that I should know whether they came in peace or war, and to have time to cry to the porter, even if they rode roughshod over me.

And though I was weak, and knew not what might happen, it was a joy untellable to be somebody again, and to gar men reckon with me.

But, being pale, I fear I made a poor figure to stand in the gate and withhold so many. For during my captivity the hair on my face had begun to grow in a manner that was surprising, and proved a constant trouble to me to keep shaven.

'Halt!' I cried to them. 'How come you to Culzean—in peace or boding in fear of war?'

'But to wish the Tutor luck on his birthday in passing,' said Gilbert, 'and then to ride on to the help of John, Earl of Cassillis.'

So, much astonished at what had befallen, and especially at his last saying, I fell in behind him, and the word was given to ride forward.

But Bargany called me to come beside him, and asked me of my health. I replied that I had been long time sick of a wound, but that I was now recovered, and above all things desired action, being sicker far of the doing of nothing.

Whereat he laughed, and said, 'Be cheerful, and if ye want blows, I will ask the loan of you as a hostage from your master.'

Then, seeing the stir about the doors, and the serving men running every way with flagons and dishes, he said, ''Tis a great stir for naught but the Tutor's birthday. What may be the occasion?'

Then, with my eyes secretly upon his, I told Gilbert Kennedy that the Lady Marjorie was to be married that day to James Mure of Auchendrayne. I never saw a man's countenance change so suddenly. The fire sprang to his eyes, and died out again like dead tinder. The heart blood flushed hot to his face, and, returning, left him pale as a maid in a decline.

Then I minded how I had taken the matter myself. Yet I was sorrier for him, because I knew that he had loved her longer and better than I. But nevertheless he tossed his sword hand in air, and cried, 'We are in time for a bridal, brave lads; this is more than we bargained for. Let us go greet the bride and wish her joy.'

And this I grant was a better way than sulking and self-pity in the greenwood, which would have been mine that day, had I been left alone.

With that he put the horses to the gallop, and we rode through the narrow pass of the drawbridge by two and two. The roar of the horses passing over was as the roar of the sea when the storm drives up from the west on the Craigs of Culzean.

As we came by the corner of the terrace, I saw him give a look at that window of the White Tower which faced to the landward. It had been the Lady Marjorie's, and now was to be hers no more. Then I saw him look down on the fretting sea, as it tumbled white on the pebbles and rocks by the Cove. And I knew why he looked there, and I knew more also, for I remembered what I had heard Marjorie say after he had gone clanking down the shore in his anger and pride.

Yet all the while Bargany rode light-hand upon his bridle-rein, the pride of his horsemen clattering behind him, gay with the music of hoofs and the dance of red and white pennons.

I wondered not that, as they said, he took the eyes of ladies wherever he went. So that the Queen's bower-women quarrelled concerning him, till Her Majesty said, 'I shall have no peace till I take him for myself. But what would James say if young Bargany were to sing "John, come kiss me now," beneath my bower window?'

But more than all ladies' favours I envied him such a brave repair of horse to follow him. For Culzean was too poor, and the Lord of Cassillis too near the bone to keep any such array of mounted gentlemen.

For hackbuttmen, and footmen with spears, were more to our Earl's mind, being better in the time of war, and a deal cheaper in the days of peace—which even in these troubled years were so many more than the days of fighting.

As we rode up, and the Bargany squadron halted with a great spattering of sand and tossing of the heads of horses, the wedding folk were just coming out. First of all there issued forth the bride, our Marjorie, the Marjorie that had been ours, on James Mure's arm—he that now was her husband. And behind them came the Minister of Maybole and Sir Thomas, walking together very caigy[#] and jocose.

[#] Friendly.

But Marjorie's face was like stone, though the bitterness of death overpast was gone from it. I trust mine eyes may never see such a look of reproach and pain in any human face, as was in hers when she saw Gilbert Kennedy sitting his horse in front of the squadron, upon the gravel stones from the seashore that were laid before the castle steps. But Gilbert only saluted her, and cried aloud as was customary, 'Luck to the wedding and health to the bride!'

Then ran Sir Thomas to him and took his hand, bubbling over with kindliness and pleasure.

'The feud is staunched indeed, when I see Bargany once more in peace at the house of Culzean, even as my good friend the Laird of Auchendrayne said it would be. What might be your kindly errand? And will ye not light off your beasts and bide to feast with us.'

'I cannot,' said Bargany. 'The Earl of Cassillis is besieged in the house of Inch by the Lairds of Galloway, and I ride to his assistance.'

Then she that had been Marjorie Kennedy turned to him, and said, 'And will ye indeed consent to staunch the feud for John Mure's sake, that would not do it for mine?'

Which seemed to me a strange mode of speech to be spoken in the hearing of a husband on his wedding day. But I had forgotten that none held the key to the utterance saving Gilbert Kennedy and myself.

'The staunching of the feud is neither yours nor mine, Lady Marjorie,' said Bargany, bending very gently toward her, 'but I cannot bide still in my house at the town of Ayr while a Kennedy of Cassillis—my enemy though he be—is dared, outfaced, and threatened by a pack of Galloway lairds.'

'Are they, then, ill men and far in the wrong?' said she.

'On the contrary, they are good men and in the right. But that does not hinder me from standing for my name and house against every other, even though that house be foredoomed to fall, because it is divided against itself.'

Then he turned to my master, saying to him, 'For this one time, and as a pledge to my Lord the Earl John that I mean his good, will you permit Launcelot, your esquire, to ride in my company—he that hath so oft ridden well against my folk?'

'Gladly,' said Sir Thomas, 'but the lad has been ill.'

'It is no far ride, and the boy needs but change of air and foes of mettle to strengthen his sword-arm against.'

So in a trice I was ready to follow my house's enemy.

As I turned I saw John Mure of Auchendrayne standing, looking in the dignity of his white hair most like a saint, though contrariwise I knew him to be that which I will not name. I heard him say to my master, 'Ye see, did not I tell you? This marriage brings all good things already. And this is but the beginning.'

'Nay,' replied Sir Thomas, 'indeed it is most gratifying and well done of you. Who would have believed a week ago that to-day Bargany would have saddled his steeds and mounted his men to ride to the succour of John, Earl of Cassillis?'

And I saw my good, simple master raise his hand and clap Auchendrayne upon the shoulder. Then, for very hate and loathing, I turned away. Even as I did so I saw the eye of John Mure on the watch, and I knew that he understood. For his glance was like a rapier-thrust when your enemy means killing.

Ere the horsemen turned to ride away, Marjorie came down the steps to where Bargany sat his charger, and slipping a ring off her finger she handed it up to him.

'For your Isobel Stewart!' she said.

And though I saw it not, I am as certain as if I had seen the crest and posy upon it that the ring was his own, one which he had given her in some past day when they had far other hopes than to part in this fashion on her wedding morning.

Then, with a quick cry of command and the gallant clatter of hoofs, we rode away. And that was the last parting in life of Gilbert and Marjorie Kennedy, who had been lovers ever since they were bairns, and had linked themselves together for man and wife with chains of yellow gowans upon the braes of Culzean.

CHAPTER XXIII

A GALLOWAY RAID

As you may suppose, it was no grief, but the reverse, for me to ride away with Bargany to the South, and leave behind me the drear house of Culzean upon that dismal day of doom and sacrifice. Nell Kennedy I saw nothing of, though, as I learned in the aftertime, she saw me. For she too had fled from the house, being unwilling to have aught to do with such a deed of cruel wrong as the marrying of her sister, that was the flower of the West, to an oafish lout like James Mure.

'Not but what our Maidie can stand up for herself. And if she gets not her own way, sorry am I even for James Mure!' said she.

It was from the branches of a thick plane that Nell watched us ride away to the house of the Inch, and noted me as I cantered by Bargany's side. Of which, had I known it then, I should have been fain. For, wild ettercap as she was, I now counted Nell Kennedy almost the only friend I had left.

And as we went, Bargany told me of the Earl's message brought him by James Young, the Minister of Colmonel. And in especial how he had telled a great lie to win through the men of Galloway—in which sin it was then uncommon for a minister to be found out.

'Not but that my heart is with the lads of Galloway,' said Bargany, 'but after all, Gibby Crack-tryst is the first of the Kennedies, and I shall not see him put down, whatever be his deserts, by Garthland and the Sheriff. If Cassillis is to go down, Bargany shall go with it; and all Galloway, twice told, shall not accomplish that!'

Although I felt chilled by the dull, unheartsome day we had left behind us, I can tell you I thought no little of myself to be thus riding in comradeship with Bargany at my elbow. For though I had so ridden with the Earl once or twice, yet I counted ten times more on Bargany. Forty horsemen were of our company, and mine was the weariest body among them all. For it was my first long day, after my sickness with harness on my back, and pulses beat where my wounds had been, so that I feared that they would break out afresh, and I have to be left behind.

At last we stayed our steeds at a small tenant's house called Craigaffie, a little way from the Inch, where a vassal of Bargany's dwelt. Him we sent to meet the Earl and tell him that we were there—also to bid the Galloway men come to an arbitrament, if so they would. For they had enclosed the Earl back and front in his own house of the Inch, so that none could pass—save indeed one that knew the byeways and outgates as did this Peter Neilson of Craigaffie.

Presently there came back from the Earl a message most piteous, for he knew the men of Galloway had him fast; and he was afraid for the safety of the rents and mails that he had with him in silver and minted gold—far more, to do him justice, than he was anxious about his own skin. Bargany was his dearly-beloved cousin, his eame, his saviour. He would keep friendship with him more than with any friend he had all the days of his life, for this notable deliverance he had wrought. He was to come and put himself in the Earl's hands after he had sent the lords of Galloway about their business. The Earl's plighted word would be his security.

At this Bargany gave a smile, and set his thumb over his shoulder at the forty swords that were riding behind him.

'These,' said he, 'will be the best security that John, Earl of Cassillis, will not harm me when I go to visit him in his castle of the Inch.'

It was no long season before there came MacDowall of Garthland and Sheriff Agnew to represent the men of Galloway, and never in my life, save when I went as herald to the great house of Kerse, did I see such an exchange of high civilities. It was as the meeting of heroes, when compared to the double-dealing and deceit of our break-tryst Earl. More than ever, I wished that I had been born on the other side of the score. But it hadna bin to be.

Agnew the Sheriff was a tall man, with dark hair quickly frosting to grey, a hawk's nose, a long arm good at laying on, and a biting tongue which he knew well when to hold. The Laird of Garthland, on the other hand, was red of beard and brown of hair, altogether a man well set, beginning also to be well-stomached with good feeding and sleeping on benches of the afternoons.

It was Garthland who saluted first, for he came of the oldest race in Galloway—save, perhaps, it may be, the MacCullochs of Ardwell. But the eagle-nosed Sheriff was the chief spokesman.

'Greeting courteously to you, Bargany,' he said. 'This is a pleasure unexpected. Over on our poor shire-side, the erne of the hills neither mixes nor mells with the quarrels of the carrion crow.'

'I greet you well, Sheriff,' said Gilbert Kennedy; 'but say your say plain out, without bringing all the birds of the air into the matter.'

'Plainly then,' said the Sheriff, 'the matter is this. The Earl has moved the law against us for rights his father granted us years agone, rights that have never been questioned, and when we will not yield to him, he uses his influence with the King to make us traitors. He sends his low-born officers to remove us from our kindly homesteadings, and from the castles where for centuries our forefathers dwelled—ay, before one stone of Cassillis lay on the top of another.' And the fire glinted in the Sheriff's deep-set eyes, till, with his eagle's beak, he looked himself the very erne of which he had spoken. He went on. 'Then comes he himself, with a force of forty horse, to reduce the unbroken baronage of Galloway. He summons us to the court of doom, and lo! we come to this yett with a hundred gentlemen, and as many more footmen that but wait to be called. We have obeyed his mandate to the letter, whereat he sulks within gates. Then we send him word that we are at the trysting-place, and that we will be most glad to see his face. But for some reason or other that I cannot guess at, he comes not; but withdraws himself into the house of the Inch, where presently he remains. And we, being bound to see that no ill befalls him within our borders, have set ourselves down to be the warders and the protectors of him and of the castle.'

So said the Sheriff, and made his courteous amend. And to him Bargany replied,—

'But, Lochnaw, ye know well that ye have no warrant thus to shut up the Earl of Cassillis, immuring your lawful feudal superior and defying ancient custom.'

Then spake the red-bearded Laird of Garthland.

'If it come to that, we are bound to you and not to the Earl, Gilbert Kennedy. Ye are bound to maintain us in our rights! Am I to lose my auld and kindly office and possession, which I have held in direct line from Uchtred, Lord of Galloway? Of a truth, no, Bargany! Ye are of a conscience overtrue for work of this kind. Ye will do to me your honourable duty, as your predecessors have ever done to mine in time past.'

And having said his say with dignity, the red Garthland held his peace.

I could see very well that Bargany was ill at ease. He liked not the errand he had come on. Blows were very well, but to be process-server sat heavy on his stomach. I heard him mutter,—

'That I, Gilbert Kennedy, should be doing John of Cassillis's dirty work! For none other sake than Marjorie's would I do this thing!'

But he took up his parable with the Lairds of Galloway.

'Hearken, Garthland and Lochnaw—if, as ye say, I am above ye, well do ye know that the Earl is by law above us both.'

He paused for a moment, wry-face, as though he had swallowed the bitterest drugs of the apothecary. And I saw the Sheriff smile a smile as bitter every whit.

'Hearken to me. If my lord continue to do ye wrong, and will not use you kindly, by mine honourable word in the hearing of all these friends, I will not only leave his lordship—I will maintain you to the last drop of my blood. But if ye pursue my lord to take his life, seeing that he has sent for me to aid him, I will defend him to the uttermost of my power.'

Then said the Sheriff, 'Bargany, we are honourable men and peaceful. We are not here to attack the Earl, but to defend ourselves in that thing in which he would do us wrong.'

'I will deal straightly with my lord,' said Bargany; 'be content, and leave the outcome to me.'

'We are content,' they replied, both of them as one. 'We ken a man when we front him, for we ourselves are men. We will abide your judgment, whatever you may command.'

So in a trice Bargany had gotten the Earl to promise all good things, and the Galloway men were satisfied. Thereafter they all dined together with my lord in the house of Inch, and parted very merry. And the men of Galloway convoyed us northward to the braes of Glenap, where the whole force and retinue of Bargany's servants and friends met us. Thus was the Earl released from durance, and his promises were loud and many, so that we were all well-contented. And I thought that the old feud was at last come to an end.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE SLAUGHTER IN THE SNOW

But, alas! I was never more disappointed, shamed, deceived in my life. For no sooner was our Earl back in his own messuages and domains, and behind his lines of hackbuttmen, than he resiled from all his promises—both to the Galloway men, who had done so honourably in the releasing and convoying of him, and (what seemed to me worse) also to Bargany, who had pledged himself in honour to satisfy the Sheriff and Garthland. For after all, a lie told to a loon of Galloway is not like one to a man's own kin and country. Though, of course, a man that is true all through the web, will not tell a lie to any. But such men are few, at least in the shire of Ayr where I dwell, and in Edinburgh to which I have at different times voyaged.

But Bargany, as was natural, was fierce in his indignation with the crack-tryst Earl.

'For,' said he, 'he has made me, that am a man of my word, break faith with men of a like pattern, even with Uchtred MacDowall of Garthland and the Sheriff of Galloway.'

So after all this tangled business, instead of peace, as my deeply-deceived master had supposed when he gave over his daughter to the traitors of Auchendrayne, there issued at the last naught but feud, more deadly and hateful than ever.

The Earl, who, to do him justice, was no coward as to his own skin, went hither and thither between Cassillis and Maybole, and even south to Auchneil, riding freely as though he had been within his own borders all the time. And the traps that were laid for him by Auchendrayne and Thomas of Drummurchie, the Laird of Bargany's barbarous brother, were too many to be told. Yet for the sake of the new alliance, such as it was, Culzean meddled not at all with the matter, though doubtless it was a source of infinite bitterness of spirit to him.

Then all of a sudden there came upon us the eleventh of December, which is a day yet remembered in Carrick, because of the many brave lads that pranked it in pride in the morning, and who yet lay stiff in their war gear or ever the early winter gloaming had fallen.

We at Culzean got our warning from the Earl's man, John Dick, on the night before, how it was the order that we were to gather at Cassillis yett and ride with them back to Maybole town all in a company. John Dick told us, but with even more than his customary surliness and unwillingness, that the cause of this raising of the clan was, that two days before Bargany had ridden past the gate of Cassillis, where the Earl was—stopping not at all, but riding by with pennons flying in despite, which was held a deadly insult to his feudal superior. So Earl John had sworn to be equal with him on his return.

It was such a day of snow (this eleventh day of December) that even in the midst of the fight, when the hackbutts were talking and the steel ringing, a man could scarce see whither he was going. At times so thick was the drift, that when a man struck at an enemy with his lance, he could not tell who it might be that opposed him, whether friend or foe.

But when, very early in the morning, we rode out to the muster, the oncoming storm had not yet begun. The air was bitter cold, blowing from the south-east, so that it drove in the faces of the Bargany folk all the day. Now, as of late years it had been customary with him, my Lord of Culzean was not able to ride with us. For the chill weather unmanned him, and he could do nothing but hurkle over the fire, with a lad to rub his swollen feet and stiff knee-joints.

So it befell that once more I had the leading of our good lads from the sea border. Right merry we were as we rode forth, for the matter seemed to us no more than a good adventure. None thought that the issue would be so grim and bloody as it proved. We were but half-way to Maybole when we came suddenly on Auchendrayne himself and John Dick, the Earl's messenger, in close converse—which I thought a strange thing, seeing that Auchendrayne was so great a favourer of the Bargany faction. So soon as they saw us come in sight they parted, and John Dick rode away over the fields, but Auchendrayne came towards us, riding easily and pleasantly as if to market.

'A good day to you,' he cried. 'Whither away, armed cap-à-pie, so early?'

'We ride to meet my lord, and to do his bidding!' I said, making my words brief and curt, because I liked not the man, for all his fine figure and commanding presence.

'Your master Sir Thomas, is, I hear, laid by with his ancient trouble. I asked John Dick concerning him. Tell him that I grieve to hear of it.'

'Without doubt, you were on your way to visit him,' I said, with mockery in my manner of speech, for it was a strange thing to meet John Mure on the wrong side of the town of Maybole at daybreak of a winter's morning.

'Without doubt,' he answered readily; 'but now that I know of his weak state of health, I need not trouble him this day!'

'There is the greater need, Laird Auchendrayne,' I made reply, 'that you should go on and cheer him with your pleasant discourse.'

He answered to that not a word good nor bad, but turned his horse and rode away to the right, making, as I guessed, a detour to avoid my lord and join our enemies of Bargany.

It was early in the morning of this famous eleventh of December (as I have been told) that there was a goodly stir and commotion in the town of Ayr. Gilbert Kennedy had resolved that he would ride that day to Bargany by way of the town of Maybole. Sorely and often they of his faction tried to dissuade him, but he was set immovably on it, as he was on anything to which he had once made up his mind.

'Think ye,' he said, 'that I am feared of John, Earl of Cassillis, or of all the Kennedies of the shore edge that ever scarted other folk's siller into their wallets like sclate-stanes?'

'Ye needna be feared,' said his brother Thomas, the Wolf of Drummurchie, 'but ye surely have enough of sense to take care of your pelt. Even a swine has that muckle. Do you think that Cassillis, and those that are with him, have not as much sense as we? They will be standing by some roadside where we have to ride by, and they will have holes cutted out, I warrant you, long or this, to shoot us in the by-ganging—-even as we did for Earl Johnnie at the limekilns of the Dalgorrachies.'

But that debauched villain, the Laird of Benane, and his little-wit sister, moved him to that pride, to which also his own heart ever too easily inclined. So, in spite of all entreaty, Bargany leaped on his charger and rode forward himself, with only ten or twelve horsemen as a first vanguard. Behind him there came other seventy, making in all the number of fourscore armed men on horseback, all good riders of mettle. Some of these were such burghers of Ayr as had a soul beyond the ell-wand, and could follow a foray and bend the pull of a pistolet with any man. For I have learned that all townsfolk are not nidderlings, as once I thought in my hot youth and little knowledge.

Now, so soon as they were well mounted there were two at Bargany's muster who rode away to warn my Lord of Cassillis by which way Bargany should come, so that he might be in array. The traitorous names of them were William Cunningham and Hew Penandgow, against both of whom Auchendrayne had warned Gilbert Kennedy. But Bargany had taken no heed, for he said, 'Never yet have I seen the time when my right arm could not keep my head against kings and earls, let alone pock-puddings and Penandgows!'

'Nor like I this day's work,' said Auchendrayne, 'for I see not here the weight of men to do your turn and carry you through.'

Yet all the time he was plotting that Gilbert Kennedy should no more ride home to Bargany, and that John Mure should rule the land in his stead.

It was not long before they came to the bridge of Doon.

There they stayed awhile, and Bargany set his fighting men in array. And, as was the custom, he made an address to them—of which I have heard much and often, for all men minded it as the speech of a brave man.

'Sirs,' he said, so that they could all catch his words, 'I am here to protest, before God, that I seek neither the life nor the dishonour of my lord. But I desire only to ride home to my house in peace, if he will let me. But if not, I look to you all to do your duty as becometh men. He that is willing to do this, out of love and kindness for me, let him tarry with me to the end. But if not, let him leave me now at this present!'

And they all answered, 'We will die in your defence if any dire hurt or pursue you!'

So being well agreed, they of Bargany rode forward. They were divided into two companies, and their faces were set toward the gate of the town. And now it befits that I speak of the things which I saw with my own eyes, and of the noble muster that we of the Cassillis faction made on the knowes outside of Maybole.

I mind well how the Earl's spies came riding in with the news that Bargany had ridden out of the town of Ayr, and what joy was in the hearts of most of us that were there, when we heard that with him he had but eighty men.

Earl John was so full of pleasure that his countenance shone, and he cracked his thumbs like a boy, seeing his enemy already in his power. He rode here and there among us, and saw to it that all the hackbuttmen had good-going matches, and all the footmen practicable spears and pikes.

When we gathered in the High Street of Maybole the snow was just beginning to fall, and presently it came driving up from the south, so that we had it on our backs all through the fight.

I was put in the very forefront of the muster with my twenty horsemen. For, save and excepting those of Culzean, and the few that surrounded his own person and were his gentlemen (as Robert Harburgh and others), my Lord of Cassillis counted not many horsemen, but rather spent his means upon providing hackbuttmen with the latest species of ordnance.

Nevertheless, gallantly enough we rode forth from Maybole, with the hackbuttmen and spearmen coming on foot after us. The street was full of them as far as one could discern through the oncoming storm, rising and falling like the waves of the sea. Yet was our soldierly figure a little spoiled by the falling snow—at least to the eyes of the women that looked down upon us in droves from the upper windows of the houses. But, of course, a soldier cared nothing for such a trifle.

When once we got outside the town, my lord bade his men line the hedges and banks, so that the hackbuttmen might have both rests for their pieces and shelter for themselves. On the other hand, the Laird of Bargany hid few hackbuttmen, for he said, 'It is not the arm of a gen'leman. Comes a bullet of lead and be he lord, prince, or peasant, Childe Roland or base craven, there is no difference and no remead.'

No sooner were we set, all under cover, than our spearmen upon the left and we upon the right, discerned the host of Bargany beginning to crown the opposite knolls. And through the pauses of the storm I could see the leaden glint of their spears, and hear the words of command. It was indeed a picked day for a grim fight to the death.

At the head of all Gilbert Kennedy rode, behind him the Wolf his brother, and the Laird of Auchendrayne wearing a long cloak, for it was a stormy day and he no longer a young man like the others. Then it was that my heart rose against the fighting, and I had no such gladness in it as was usual with me, all for the sake of young Bargany, whom I loved. Yet as soon as I set eyes upon John Mure of Auchendrayne, I felt the iron grow in my veins and the hot anger mount to my head. Of its own accord my hand gripped the spearhilt, for this day, by the Earl's command, I was again to lay a lance in rest. But I had now learned the game and art of it, and took lessons no longer from anyone.

'If the Lord prosper me this day, I will make an end of one false rogue!' So I vowed, solemn as if I had been in the kirk on a Sabbath day.

Then the two forces drew so close together that we could see and hear one another—that is, before the snow swept down, blotting out faces and forms, friend and foe alike.

Immediately there began the challenging and taunting, as is ever the way in these clan battles, where every fighter knows everyone else, and has met him at kirk and market a score of times.

Then Patrick Rippitt, that was ever a wild lad, cried out for provocation to the Laird of Bargany's younger brother, with whom he had some quarrel about a lass.

'Laird of Benane, Laird of Benane, this is I, Patrick Rippitt, that took your hackbutt from you! For thy latest love's sake, come down to the hollow and break a tree with me.'

For that was his manner of challenging his enemy to fight with lances. And again, 'Then for all thy loves sake,' cried Patrick, which made a laugh, for Benane's loves were comparable to the snowflakes for number, and eke for the lightness—but by no means the whiteness of their characters.

'For all thy loves' sakes, come down, and I will gar thy harns clatter!'

But Benane was silent and returned no answer, albeit the moment before he had been giving Bargany counsel to ride forward at the charge. But Benane was a man, debonnair but feckless, a weighty man with his tongue, but thewless and unable of his hands.

Long ere this the men of Ayr were keen to be at the shooting. But Bargany held them in, saying, 'I will go to the length of my tether in eschewing all cummer and bickering, so far as I may.'

And with that he wheeled about his force off the knows of the Lady Carse, and went down by the bogside of Dinhame, to see whether a way might be won in that direction, without coming to the bloody arbitrament of battle.

But my lord the Earl cried out, 'Ware ye, there on the left. They would turn our flank and take us at unawares!'

So he spread out his hackbuttmen, and made them race down the ridges over against Bargany's men, till they won to the foot of the Bog of Dinhame. There on the edge of the moss was a wall of turf, or, as the country folk call it, a 'fail dyke,' so our hackbuttmen, coming to it, first lined it, and then began to fire on Bargany, who was somewhat disconcerted and taken aback at their alertness. I galloped round to the right, to make safe the wing with my little band of horse, for I feared we might be suddenly assaulted by the whole band of eighty.

However, as it happened, the sudden shooting of our musketeers threw their lines into confusion, some of them halting by a little burn-side that was at the bog-foot. This staying of the charge gave further courage to our musketeers, who had full time to plant their rests and make their matches ready. Our pikemen also gathered at the back of the turf dyke and levelled their weapons over the heads of the kneeling hackbuttmen, so that it had been as vain for the whole company to have charged upon us, as for them to have attacked the walls of Calais.

Nevertheless, I saw them muster again boldly and come at us. I caught the trampling of their horses as they gathered speed. The fire of our musketeers flickered out here and there adown the line, for it was a dark afternoon and the flashes could clearly be seen. I saw sundry horses go down and heard men fall, the iron plates of their mail clashing on the frost-firmed ground. Some of those who started most gallantly reeled in their saddles, threw up their arms and fell backwards, while their horses galloped riderless away, for that is the manner of men's falling who are smitten by the bullet as they ride.

The Wolf of Drummurchie was down. I hoped that he would rise no more, for he was a most cruel beast and the bane of many lives. Indeed, from before the fire of our musketeers, all trained marksmen, the riders of Bargany who had been so proud, fairly melted away. Thus was Earl John justified of his dependence upon powder and lead.

CHAPTER XXV

MARJORIE BIDS HER LOVE GOOD-NIGHT

I was just rejoicing that the battle was well over, and that the victory remained with us without great shedding of blood, when to my infinite astonishment I saw a little dark cloud of five or six men disengage them from the deray, and charge straight at the thickest of us. They seemed to come suddenly out of the midst of the battling snowstorm, for the driven flakes beat so in their faces, that had it not been shed from their armour they would have been fairly sheeted white in it, as indeed were the trappings of their horses.

In a moment more they were amongst us—Bargany himself first of all, with Cloncaird and James and Andro Bannatyne, and behind them, with his sword bare, Auchendrayne himself. Yet I opine he came not willingly, but that his horse, unaccustomed to noise, ran away with him. By what freak of madness they resolved thus to charge, as it had been an army in position, it is beyond me to tell. In a moment these five were in the midst of the slicing steel and the flame of ordnance—the snow-flakes driving in their eyes and their swords cutting a way through the white drift to reach the foe.

Never was there such a fight—at least, not in this land, for there were but five of them to near a hundred of us! So that I saw no honour in the battle, and besides, it went hard with me to have to smite that Gilbert Kennedy, at whose side I had ridden so blithely all the way to the house of the Inch.

But I spurred Dom Nicholas forward with a kind of joy, toward the mound where Auchendrayne had managed to stay his horse just outside the heady rush of the fight. I saw that he meant to watch what the end might be, but I was determined that I should give him more than he bargained for. So I couched lance, and crying, 'A Kennedy!' held at him, swinging a pistol point-blank as I came, and throwing it away as I gripped the spear. And this time at least I might well have been called Spurheel, for I rowelled Dom Nicholas most vigorously. I came upon John Mure with a surge, so that I clean overbore him with a lance-thrust in the thigh. I cared not a jot that he was old. The devil was older than he, and besides, if he wanted not to stand the chance of battle, he might even have bided at home for the quarrel was none of his.

And it had been telling all of us if I had stayed to finish him. When I think of the ill the man did afterwards, and how for years he had been bringing many to their deaths, I can bite my thumb for letting him off scot-free.

But, like a fool, I contented myself with the lance-thrust and the chance pistol bullet I sped at him in the heat of the fight. For I never could abide the cruel slaying of the wounded, which is practised even more in these private wars than in the great affairs of nations. And this over delicacy has often stood in the way of my advantage.

So I turned, and left Auchendrayne lying on the ground. As I came back I heard Bargany crying out, 'I fear we are too few! But have at them till we die!'

There was but one that fought with him, all his other companions being stricken down. And in a trice he alone was left on his horse. Nevertheless, it was with a light hand on the rein and a feat touch of the heel, that Gilbert Kennedy kept his head, though the blows fell like hail on his armour. There were three that he held at arm's length—all the while crying out for the Earl, and trying fiercely to break through the spearmen, who stood like a fence about the person of Cassillis.

'Where is my lord himself?' he cried. 'Let him now keep promise, and come out like a man to break a tree with me!'

So went the fight of the one against many, and such deeds of valiance saw I never any man do in this realm of Scotland, though in my time I have seen so many brave and worthy things done. For Gilbert Kennedy attacked Patrick Rippitt and Quintain Crawford with strokes that nearly dang them senseless, crying at each blow, 'Bargany! Bargany! To the rescue, Bargany!' But ever as he raged through the fight like a lion, I saw John Dick watching him with a poised lance in his hand. And while Gilbert was at blows with Rippitt and Big Quintain, Dick raised the spear and sent it quivering at him, with an art which I never saw any man master of, save only himself. Gilbert Kennedy had taken no note of him—for, as I heard afterwards, Auchendrayne had told all that were in the camp of Bargany, that John Dick was his man, and his paid intelligencer in the host of the enemy.

The poised lance struck young Bargany full in the neck and stayed. So in the midst of his foes, and striking at them to the last, he fell, who was the bravest man of his age. And at his overthrow there fell a silence for a space, and the battle smother cleared. Only the snow fell and scarce melted on the face that was already white and set in death.

We crossed our spears and made a bier with our cloaks, whereon we laid him. Then very gently I drew away the deadly lance, though the wound bled not much, but inwardly, which was worse. We thought to bear him to some castle of his own folk, as it might be to the house of Auchdrayne. But the Earl John came and looked at his foe and kinsman as he lay on the snow with his eyes closed.

'Carry him to my castle at the town end of Maybole,' said he, 'for that is near by.'

Now I thought that not the best place in the world for the young man's recovery, but, being bidden, it was not mine to reply, but only to obey.

We came to the portcullis gate of Maybole, and were bearing him in upon our shoulders, when down the road to the town there came, riding like the wind, first a lady and then a man that followed hotly in pursuit. When they came nearer, I saw that the lady was she who had been Marjorie Kennedy, and that the man riding after was her husband, James Mure. At sight of us who bore the soldier's bier slowly on our spears, Marjorie leaped from her horse, and left it to wander, bridle free, whither it would. But a page seized and held it.

She came swiftly to where we were carrying our burden on the crossed lances.

'Is it Gilbert Kennedy?' she said.

We told her ay.

'Lay him down under the gate,' she commanded, 'I would speak with him.'

'But, my lady Marjorie,' I said, as gently as I could, 'I fear that he is dead already.'

'Then I would even speak to him dead,' she cried. 'Lay him down!'

Her husband came up to take her by the hand as if to remove her, but she turned on him in white anger, swift and flaming.

'You that have never yet dared to lay a hand on me, is it like that you shall begin now? Go, look to your father; cravens that shun the battle ought not to brawl with women in the gate!'

And without further remonstrance James Mure slunk away, like the very pitiful rogue that he was. I could have kicked the cur, and wished there had been fewer folk there—for I had done it too.

Then she that had been so proud and haughty to young Bargany when he was alive, took the fair, wounded head in her arms, crouching beside him in the dun, trampled snow, while the flakes blew in upon her unbound hair. She crooned and hushed him like a bairn, while we that had borne him stood wide from her, some turning away altogether. But, because I knew all and loved her, I stood near.

'Gilbert,' she said, 'noblest and dearest, never doubt but that I loved you—never loved but you. Though I flouted you oft, and ever sent you empty away, yet I loved you and none other. And I want the world to know that I loved him—ay,' she said, turning her face up to us all defiantly, 'ay, and loved him with clean hands, too, for he that is dead never knew it. But I desire you that were his enemies in life, to know that I, Marjorie Kennedy, honoured myself by loving the noblest man and the fairest—not that thing there, who by cozenance bought me, as cattle are bought in the market-place.'

She laid down his head very gently, taking a fine silken scarve, soft and white, from her own neck. And in the folds of that which was yet warm with the warmth of her pure and gracious bosom, she wrapped from common sight the head of him who had died without knowledge of her love.

Then she kneeled low down upon her knees, clasping hands and holding the last fold of the napkin ere she covered his face from sight.

'Ah, best beloved,' she said very gently, yet so that I could hear, 'fare thee well! So have I never said farewell before. But ever scornfully, being in fear of mine own heart's treachery. Lie you there that wert the noblest man the sun shone on, of adversaries the most fearless, of enemies the most chivalrous, of friends the truest, of loves the sweetest—lie you there. Those that hated you were many. But there was one that loved you—ay, and loves you, and ever shall love you! Lie you there, heart that never feared aught but God and dishonour and a lie—heart that never took favour from man nor refused one to woman. See, I will touch your lips—those sweetest lips that never of my own will, have I touched before. The earth be kind to your body, sweet. The heavens receive your soul with honour, and the angels that warred with Satan and vanquished him, stand up at your entrance to give you room!'

She smoothed the cloth upon the face with mighty love in the caressing of her finger tips.

'Good-night, dear love,' she said, lifting it for the last time and kissing his brow. 'It is sweet, even thus in death, to tell thee that I love thee!'

Then, when Marjorie had done bidding her love farewell, we lifted the crossed spears, and setting them again on the shoulders of men, we carried Gilbert of Bargany away.

CHAPTER XXVI

DAYS OF QUIET

I ran back to bid Marjorie return with us to Culzean, where at least we could keep her safe. She stood where we had left her, looking at the place where her love had lain. The marks of the crossed spears and certain drops of blood alone remained on the snow.

At the sound of my voice she started as from a dream.

'Ah, Launcelot,' she said, looking at me strangely, as though I too had been dead and in a newer life had unexpectedly confronted her, 'do you think that I, who fear not fifty in the highway, fear one or two in the house of Auchendrayne? My work is not done there yet,' she added; 'till it be, there I shall bide.'

And with that she mounted and rode away. Never did I see a cavalcade ride home in such fashion after a victory. There was not a man of us from Culzean but went with his head hanging down like a little whipped cur. And when we told Sir Thomas he was like to break his heart, for he was a kindly man, and had ever a great affection for Bargany.

And Nell, when she heard it, went out and stopped the boys that played at ball and shouted in the tennis-court. Also, to keep them sober, she set them to learn their religion—of which, in common with all in that country side (save perhaps my master) they had great need.

But strange to tell, after the grief for Bargany's death was a little by-past among us, there befell the quietest and most gracious time that ever had been in the house of Culzean. It was like the coming of joy after the rain—the warm rain of pity which thawed our winter-frozen hearts.

Yet the things that happened during these months were many. First of all there was the marrying of my pretty cruel Kate to Robert Harburgh, who had at last gotten leave to depart from the Earl, and the down-sitting to settle on. So the day came that I had looked for to be so bitter to me, and lo! it was not bitter at all; for I stood beside Nell Kennedy in white, who was Kate Allison's best maid, and it was indeed a sight comely. Then it was that for the first time I honestly judged Nell to be more beautiful than her sister Marjorie, of which I have often thought since.

When all was over, and Nell and I had done racing and throwing of old shoes after them, as they rode away together to their well-furnished house of Chitterlintie, it chanced that she and I walked home together. We were silent a long while.

Then said I, 'Nell, do you remember how it was our daily use to quarrel?'

'And so it may be again,' she said, tossing her head.

'I wonder where the rope is, and the tow-steps that used to dangle from the White Tower?' she asked after a moment.

'They are e'en there yet,' I said, 'if it be that you desire to go and see your lad. But be more timely, I pray you, in your homecoming, for now you have no excuse in the way of sisters—'

Then I remembered, and was shamed. However, Nell paid no heed, but seemed to be thinking of something else.

'Nor have you now any excuse for going down by to Sandy the Grieve's,' she said, giving me tit for tat.

'Nell,' said I, 'we are very good friends, are we not?

'Ay,' said she, drily, 'brawly do I ken the reason of that.'

'And what may the reason be?' I asked of her.

'Just that I am all there is left,' she said, so quickly that I declare the saying took the wind from me, like a sudden blow where one's breath bides. Nor do I yet know the answer to that, for on the surface of the thing there was certainly some reason in what she said.

'Oh, I am not proud,' she went on, 'and you and I are good friends and good company. I am e'en content to be Mistress Do-no-better!'

'Nell,' said I, going nearer to her, and taking her hand, 'Nell, you and I are now to be more than that.'

But she drew her hand away with a jerk.

'Try a new way of it,' she said; 'I am not taking Mistress Katherine Allison's cast-off sweet speeches!'

So that base little wretch Kate Allison had been at the telling of tales!

After this I saw no better way out of the bog than to withdraw myself from her, and walk apart in that silent dignity, which, upon occasion, I have at my command.

'No, Launce,' she said, standing up with her hands behind her and her mouth pouted, 'you are a good lad enough, but simple. I knew that I would send you into the sulks. That was the reason I said it. If you take me for a sweet confection that melts in the mouth, you mistake me sorely!'

But I made no answer, not indeed having any to make, and so marched off by myself. Yet for all Nell's ill-treatment and scorning of me, I did not grieve any more for that minx Kate. For, as I was no long time in discovering, the pretty traitress had told Nell many of those sweet things I had said to her. I never imagined that girls told such speeches and love-makings the one to the other. I had aways believed that a lass kept her own secrets, and only told other people's. It was, indeed, most true what Nell had cast up to me. I was but a simple lad.

CHAPTER XXVII

ON THE HEARTSOME HEATHER

Now I must tell during this time of Sir Thomas Kennedy. He seemed altogether another man. He had ever, indeed, been kindly and generous, forgiving and unsuspicious. But during these spring months of the year after Bargany's death, he seemed to ripen like a winter apple when it is laid by, till there was no more sourness in him anywhere.

Oftentimes he would come and cause me to read to him out of the Gospels. Aforetime it had always been from the Old Testament, which I had ever thought the more interesting, till Sir Thomas that spring showed me other of it, making me read through the Holy Gospels.

Indeed, to talk with him and watch his life was better than any sermon. I declare that before I understood his character and thought, I knew not that religion was aught more than the colour of a faction—a thing to fight about, like the blood feuds of Cassillis and Bargany, concerning the wrong and right of which not one in a thousand knows anything, and still fewer care.

Yet for all his increasing gentleness there was naught unmanly about my lord, but ever the bearing and speech of a most courteous knight. He had a great love for noble and sweet music, and often diverted himself on the viol, upon which he played most masterly. The scurril jest, indeed, he would sharply reprove; but his heart still inclined to wit and mirth, and his countenance was constantly cheerful.

Specially this was so when he and I, with Nell and little David, rode south to Galloway, where we were to abide a long season with Sheriff Agnew. For Marget Kennedy, his eldest daughter, was married to the young Laird, the Sheriff's son, and abode at the castle of Lochnaw. Now in these days the air of Galloway, brisk yet kindly, suited my master better than the sea winds which were ever blowing about Culzean. And what was more to him than all Galloway was not so torn by feuds as Carrick and Kyle. And a man held not his life ever in the palm of his hand, as a tavern drawer does an unsteady cup which at any moment may be spilled. Nevertheless my good master found an infinite sadness in this, that in a wide realm of men that are called Christians, I, Launcelot Kennedy, should have come to the years of manhood with no better opinion of religion than that it was the rag of faction. And this, too, with ministers in mostly every parish, with preachings and communings, and all the outer husk of godliness.