Old Mortality, Complete

The path through which the traveller descended was occasionally shaded by detached trees of great size, and elsewhere by the hedges and boughs of flourishing orchards, now laden with summer fruits.

The nearest object of consequence was a farmhouse, or, it might be, the abode of a small proprietor, situated on the side of a sunny bank which was covered by apple and pear trees. At the foot of the path which led up to this modest mansion was a small cottage, pretty much in the situation of a porter’s lodge, though obviously not designed for such a purpose. The hut seemed comfortable, and more neatly arranged than is usual in Scotland. It had its little garden, where some fruit-trees and bushes were mingled with kitchen herbs; a cow and six sheep fed in a paddock hard by; the cock strutted and crowed, and summoned his family around him before the door; a heap of brushwood and turf, neatly made up, indicated that the winter fuel was provided; and the thin blue smoke which ascended from the straw-bound chimney, and winded slowly out from among the green trees, showed that the evening meal was in the act of being made ready. To complete the little scene of rural peace and comfort, a girl of about five years old was fetching water in a pitcher from a beautiful fountain of the purest transparency, which bubbled up at the root of a decayed old oak-tree about twenty yards from the end of the cottage.

The stranger reined up his horse and called to the little nymph, desiring to know the way to Fairy Knowe. The child set down her water-pitcher, hardly understanding what was said to her, put her fair flaxen hair apart on her brows, and opened her round blue eyes with the wondering “What’s your wull?” which is usually a peasant’s first answer, if it can be called one, to all questions whatever.

“I wish to know the way to Fairy Knowe.”

“Mammie, mammie,” exclaimed the little rustic, running towards the door of the hut, “come out and speak to the gentleman.”

Her mother appeared,—a handsome young country-woman, to whose features, originally sly and espiegle in expression, matrimony had given that decent matronly air which peculiarly marks the peasant’s wife of Scotland. She had an infant in one arm, and with the other she smoothed down her apron, to which hung a chubby child of two years old. The elder girl, whom the traveller had first seen, fell back behind her mother as soon as she appeared, and kept that station, occasionally peeping out to look at the stranger.

“What was your pleasure, sir?” said the woman, with an air of respectful breeding not quite common in her rank of life, but without anything resembling forwardness.

The stranger looked at her with great earnestness for a moment, and then replied, “I am seeking a place called Fairy Knowe, and a man called Cuthbert Headrigg. You can probably direct me to him?”

“It’s my gudeman, sir,” said the young woman, with a smile of welcome. “Will you alight, sir, and come into our puir dwelling?—Cuddie, Cuddie,”—a white-headed rogue of four years appeared at the door of the hut—“rin awa, my bonny man, and tell your father a gentleman wants him. Or, stay,—Jenny, ye’ll hae mair sense: rin ye awa and tell him; he’s down at the Four-acres Park.—Winna ye light down and bide a blink, sir? Or would ye take a mouthfu’ o’ bread and cheese, or a drink o’ ale, till our gudeman comes. It’s gude ale, though I shouldna say sae that brews it; but ploughmanlads work hard, and maun hae something to keep their hearts abune by ordinar, sae I aye pit a gude gowpin o’ maut to the browst.”

As the stranger declined her courteous offers, Cuddie, the reader’s old acquaintance, made his appearance in person. His countenance still presented the same mixture of apparent dulness with occasional sparkles, which indicated the craft so often found in the clouted shoe. He looked on the rider as on one whom he never had before seen, and, like his daughter and wife, opened the conversation with the regular query, “What’s your wull wi’ me, sir?”

“I have a curiosity to ask some questions about this country,” said the traveller, “and I was directed to you as an intelligent man who can answer them.”

“Nae doubt, sir,” said Cuddie, after a moment’s hesitation. “But I would first like to ken what sort of questions they are. I hae had sae mony questions speered at me in my day, and in sic queer ways, that if ye kend a’, ye wadna wonder at my jalousing a’ thing about them. My mother gar ‘d me learn the Single Carritch, whilk was a great vex; then I behoved to learn about my godfathers and godmothers to please the auld leddy; and whiles I jumbled them thegether and pleased nane o’ them; and when I cam to man’s yestate, cam another kind o’ questioning in fashion that I liked waur than Effectual Calling; and the ‘did promise and vow’ of the tape were yokit to the end o’ the tother. Sae ye see, sir, I aye like to hear questions asked befor I answer them.”

“You have nothing to apprehend from mine, my good friend; they only relate to the state of the country.”

“Country?” replied Cuddie; “ou, the country’s weel eneugh, an it werena that dour deevil, Claver’se (they ca’ him Dundee now), that’s stirring about yet in the Highlands, they say, wi’ a’ the Donalds and Duncans and Dugalds, that ever wore bottomless breeks, driving about wi’ him, to set things asteer again, now we hae gotten them a’ reasonably weel settled. But Mackay will pit him down, there’s little doubt o’ that; he’ll gie him his fairing, I’ll be caution for it.”

“What makes you so positive of that, my friend?” asked the horseman.

“I heard it wi’ my ain lugs,” answered Cuddie, “foretauld to him by a man that had been three hours stane dead, and came back to this earth again just to tell him his mind. It was at a place they ca’ Drumshinnel.”

“Indeed?” said the stranger. “I can hardly believe you, my friend.”

“Ye might ask my mither, then, if she were in life,” said Cuddie; “it was her explained it a’ to me, for I thought the man had only been wounded. At ony rate, he spake of the casting out of the Stewarts by their very names, and the vengeance that was brewing for Claver’se and his dragoons. They ca’d the man Habakkuk Mucklewrath; his brain was a wee ajee, but he was a braw preacher for a’ that.”

“You seem,” said the stranger, “to live in a rich and peaceful country.”

“It’s no to compleen o’, sir, an we get the crap weel in,” quoth Cuddie; “but if ye had seen the blude rinnin’ as fast on the tap o’ that brigg yonder as ever the water ran below it, ye wadna hae thought it sae bonnie a spectacle.”

“You mean the battle some years since? I was waiting upon Monmouth that morning, my good friend, and did see some part of the action,” said the stranger.

“Then ye saw a bonny stour,” said Cuddie, “that sail serve me for fighting a’ the days o’ my life. I judged ye wad be a trooper, by your red scarlet lace-coat and your looped hat.”

“And which side were you upon, my friend?” continued the inquisitive stranger.

“Aha, lad?” retorted Cuddie, with a knowing look, or what he designed for such,—“there ‘s nae use in telling that, unless I kend wha was asking me.”

“I commend your prudence, but it is unnecessary; I know you acted on that occasion as servant to Henry Morton.”

“Ay!” said Cuddie, in surprise, “how came ye by that secret? No that I need care a bodee about it, for the sun’s on our side o’ the hedge now. I wish my master were living to get a blink o’t.”

“And what became of him?” said the rider.

“He was lost in the vessel gaun to that weary Holland,—clean lost; and a’ body perished, and my poor master amang them. Neither man nor mouse was ever heard o’ mair.” Then Cuddie uttered a groan.

“You had some regard for him, then?” continued the stranger.

“How could I help it? His face was made of a fiddle, as they say, for a’ body that looked on him liked him. And a braw soldier he was. Oh, an ye had but seen him down at the brigg there, fleeing about like a fleeing dragon to gar folk fight that had unto little will till ‘t! There was he and that sour Whigamore they ca’d Burley: if twa men could hae won a field, we wadna hae gotten our skins paid that day.”

“You mention Burley: do you know if he yet lives?”

“I kenna muckle about him. Folk say he was abroad, and our sufferers wad hold no communion wi’ him, because o’ his having murdered the archbishop. Sae he cam hame ten times dourer than ever, and broke aff wi’ mony o’ the Presbyterians; and at this last coming of the Prince of Orange he could get nae countenance nor command for fear of his deevilish temper, and he hasna been heard of since; only some folk say that pride and anger hae driven him clean wud.”

“And—and,” said the traveller, after considerable hesitation,—“do you know anything of Lord Evan dale?”

“Div I ken onything o’ Lord Evandale? Div I no? Is not my young leddy up by yonder at the house, that’s as gude as married to him?”

“And are they not married, then?” said the rider, hastily.

“No, only what they ca’ betrothed,—me and my wife were witnesses. It’s no mony months bypast; it was a lang courtship,—few folk kend the reason by Jenny and mysell. But will ye no light down? I downa bide to see ye sitting up there, and the clouds are casting up thick in the west ower Glasgow-ward, and maist skeily folk think that bodes rain.”

In fact, a deep black cloud had already surmounted the setting sun; a few large drops of rain fell, and the murmurs of distant thunder were heard.

“The deil’s in this man,” said Cuddie to himself; “I wish he would either light aff or ride on, that he may quarter himsell in Hamilton or the shower begin.”

But the rider sate motionless on his horse for two or three moments after his last question, like one exhausted by some uncommon effort. At length, recovering himself as if with a sudden and painful effort, he asked Cuddie “if Lady Margaret Bellenden still lived.”

“She does,” replied Cuddie, “but in a very sma’ way. They hae been a sad changed family since thae rough times began; they hae suffered eneugh first and last,—and to lose the auld Tower and a’ the bonny barony and the holms that I hae pleughed sae often, and the Mains, and my kale-yard, that I suld hae gotten back again, and a’ for naething, as ‘a body may say, but just the want o’ some bits of sheep-skin that were lost in the confusion of the taking of Tillietudlem.”

“I have heard something of this,” said the stranger, deepening his voice and averting his head. “I have some interest in the family, and would willingly help them if I could. Can you give me a bed in your house to-night, my friend?”

“It’s but a corner of a place, sir,” said Cuddie, “but we’se try, rather than ye suld ride on in the rain and thunner; for, to be free wi’ ye, sir, I think ye seem no that ower weel.”

“I am liable to a dizziness,” said the stranger, “but it will soon wear off.”

“I ken we can gie ye a decent supper, sir,” said Cuddie; “and we’ll see about a bed as weel as we can. We wad be laith a stranger suld lack what we have, though we are jimply provided for in beds rather; for Jenny has sae mony bairns (God bless them and her) that troth I maun speak to Lord Evandale to gie us a bit eik, or outshot o’ some sort, to the onstead.”

“I shall be easily accommodated,” said the stranger, as he entered the house.

“And ye may rely on your naig being weel sorted,” said Cuddie; “I ken weel what belangs to suppering a horse, and this is a very gude ane.” Cuddie took the horse to the little cow-house, and called to his wife to attend in the mean while to the stranger’s accommodation. The officer entered, and threw himself on a settle at some distance from the fire, and carefully turning his back to the little lattice window. Jenny, or Mrs. Headrigg, if the reader pleases, requested him to lay aside the cloak, belt, and flapped hat which he wore upon his journey, but he excused himself under pretence of feeling cold, and, to divert the time till Cuddie’s return, he entered into some chat with the children, carefully avoiding, during the interval, the inquisitive glances of his landlady.

CHAPTER XVII

What tragic tears bedim the eye!What deaths we suffer ere we die!Our broken friendships we deplore,And loves of youth that are no more.LOGAN.

Cuddie soon returned, assuring the stranger, with a cheerful voice, “that the horse was properly suppered up, and that the gudewife should make a bed up for him at the house, mair purpose-like and comfortable than the like o’ them could gie him.”

“Are the family at the house?” said the stranger, with an interrupted and broken voice.

“No, stir, they’re awa wi’ a’ the servants,—they keep only twa nowadays, and my gudewife there has the keys and the charge, though she’s no a fee’d servant. She has been born and bred in the family, and has a’ trust and management. If they were there, we behovedna to take sic freedom without their order; but when they are awa, they will be weel pleased we serve a stranger gentleman. Miss Bellenden wad help a’ the haill warld, an her power were as gude as her will; and her grandmother, Leddy Margaret, has an unto respect for the gentry, and she’s no ill to the poor bodies neither.—And now, wife, what for are ye no getting forrit wi’ the sowens?”

“Never mind, lad,” rejoined Jenny, “ye sall hae them in gude time; I ken weel that ye like your brose het.”

Cuddie fidgeted and laughed with a peculiar expression of intelligence at this repartee, which was followed by a dialogue of little consequence betwixt his wife and him, in which the stranger took no share. At length he suddenly interrupted them by the question: “Can you tell me when Lord Evandale’s marriage takes place?”

“Very soon, we expect,” answered Jenny, before it was possible for her husband to reply; “it wad hae been ower afore now, but for the death o’ auld Major Bellenden.”

“The excellent old man!” said the stranger; “I heard at Edinburgh he was no more. Was he long ill?”

“He couldna be said to haud up his head after his brother’s wife and his niece were turned out o’ their ain house; and he had himsell sair borrowing siller to stand the law,—but it was in the latter end o’ King James’s days; and Basil Olifant, who claimed the estate, turned a papist to please the managers, and then naething was to be refused him. Sae the law gaed again the leddies at last, after they had fought a weary sort o’ years about it; and, as I said before, the major ne’er held up his head again. And then cam the pitting awa o’ the Stewart line; and, though he had but little reason to like them, he couldna brook that, and it clean broke the heart o’ him; and creditors cam to Charnwood and cleaned out a’ that was there,—he was never rich, the gude auld man, for he dow’d na see onybody want.”

“He was indeed,” said the stranger, with a faltering voice, “an admirable man,—that is, I have heard that he was so. So the ladies were left without fortune, as well as without a protector?”

“They will neither want the tane nor the tother while Lord Evandale lives,” said Jenny; “he has been a true friend in their griefs. E’en to the house they live in is his lordship’s; and never man, as my auld gudemother used to say, since the days of the Patriarch Jacob, served sae lang and sae sair for a wife as gude Lord Evandale has dune.”

“And why,” said the stranger, with a voice that quivered with emotion, “why was he not sooner rewarded by the object of his attachment?”

“There was the lawsuit to be ended,” said Jenny readily, “forby many other family arrangements.”

“Na, but,” said Cuddie, “there was another reason forby; for the young leddy—”

“Whisht, hand your tongue, and sup your sowens,” said his wife; “I see the gentleman’s far frae weel, and downa eat our coarse supper. I wad kill him a chicken in an instant.”

“There is no occasion,” said the stranger; “I shall want only a glass of water, and to be left alone.”

“You’ll gie yoursell the trouble then to follow me,” said Jenny, lighting a small lantern, “and I’ll show you the way.”

Cuddie also proffered his assistance; but his wife reminded him, “That the bairns would be left to fight thegither, and coup ane anither into the fire,” so that he remained to take charge of the menage. His wife led the way up a little winding path, which, after threading some thickets of sweetbrier and honeysuckle, conducted to the back-door of a small garden. Jenny undid the latch, and they passed through an old-fashioned flower-garden, with its clipped yew hedges and formal parterres, to a glass-sashed door, which she opened with a master-key, and lighting a candle, which she placed upon a small work-table, asked pardon for leaving him there for a few minutes, until she prepared his apartment. She did not exceed five minutes in these preparations; but when she returned, was startled to find that the stranger had sunk forward with his head upon the table, in what she at first apprehended to be a swoon. As she advanced to him, however, she could discover by his short-drawn sobs that it was a paroxysm of mental agony. She prudently drew back until he raised his head, and then showing herself, without seeming to have observed his agitation, informed him that his bed was prepared. The stranger gazed at her a moment, as if to collect the sense of her words. She repeated them; and only bending his head, as an indication that he understood her, he entered the apartment, the door of which she pointed out to him. It was a small bedchamber, used, as she informed him, by Lord Evandale when a guest at Fairy Knowe, connecting, on one side, with a little china-cabinet which opened to the garden, and on the other, with a saloon, from which it was only separated by a thin wainscot partition. Having wished the stranger better health and good rest, Jenny descended as speedily as she could to her own mansion.

“Oh, Cuddie!” she exclaimed to her helpmate as she entered, “I doubt we’re ruined folk!”

“How can that be? What’s the matter wi’ ye?” returned the imperturbed Cuddie, who was one of those persons who do not easily take alarm at anything.

“Wha d’ ye think yon gentleman is? Oh that ever ye suld hae asked him to light here!” exclaimed Jenny.

“Why, wha the muckle deil d’ye say he is? There’s nae law against harbouring and intercommunicating now,” said Cuddie; “sae, Whig or Tory, what need we care wha he be?”

“Ay, but it’s ane will ding Lord Evandale’s marriage ajee yet, if it ‘s no the better looked to,” said Jenny; “it’s Miss Edith’s first joe, your ain auld maister, Cuddie.”

“The deil, woman!” exclaimed Cuddie, starting up, “Crow ye that I am blind? I wad hae kend Mr. Harry Morton amang a hunder.”

“Ay, but, Cuddie lad,” replied Jenny, “though ye are no blind, ye are no sae notice-taking as I am.”

“Weel, what for needs ye cast that up to me just now; or what did ye see about the man that was like our Maister Harry?”

“I will tell ye,” said Jenny. “I jaloused his keeping his face frae us, and speaking wi’ a madelike voice, sae I e’en tried him wi’ some tales o lang syne; and when I spake o’ the brose, ye ken, he didna just laugh,—he’s ower grave for that nowadays, but he gae a gledge wi’ his ee that I kend he took up what I said. And a’ his distress is about Miss Edith’s marriage; and I ne’er saw a man mair taen down wi’ true love in my days,—I might say man or woman, only I mind how ill Miss Edith was when she first gat word that him and you (ye muckle graceless loon) were coming against Tillietudlem wi’ the rebels.—But what’s the matter wi’ the man now?”

“What’s the matter wi’ me indeed!” said Cuddie, who was again hastily putting on some of the garments he had stripped himself of; “am I no gaun up this instant to see my maister?”

“Atweel, Cuddie, ye are gaun nae sic gate,” said Jenny, coolly and resolutely.

“The deil’s in the wife!” said Cuddie. “D ‘ye think I am to be John Tamson’s man, and maistered by women a’ the days o’ my life?”

“And whase man wad ye be? And wha wad ye hae to maister ye but me, Cuddie, lad?” answered Jenny. “I’ll gar ye comprehend in the making of a hay-band. Naebody kens that this young gentleman is living but oursells; and frae that he keeps himsell up sae close, I am judging that he’s purposing, if he fand Miss Edith either married, or just gaun to be married, he wad just slide awa easy, and gie them nae mair trouble. But if Miss Edith kend that he was living, and if she were standing before the very minister wi’ Lord Evandale when it was tauld to her, I’se warrant she wad say No when she suld say Yes.”

“Weel,” replied Cuddie, “and what’s my business wi’ that? If Miss Edith likes her auld joe better than her new ane, what for suld she no be free to change her mind like other folk? Ye ken, Jenny, Halliday aye threeps he had a promise frae yoursell.”

“Halliday’s a liar, and ye’re naething but a gomeril to hearken till him, Cuddie. And then for this leddy’s choice, lack-a-day! ye may be sure a’ the gowd Mr. Morton has is on the outside o’ his coat; and how can he keep Leddy Margaret and the young leddy?”

“Isna there Milnwood?” said Cuddie. “Nae doubt the auld laird left his housekeeper the liferent, as he heard nought o’ his nephew; but it’s but speaking the auld wife fair, and they may a’ live brawly thegither, Leddy Margaret and a’.”

“Rout tout, lad,” replied Jenny; “ye ken them little to think leddies o’ their rank wad set up house wi’ auld Ailie Wilson, when they’re maist ower proud to take favours frae Lord Evandale himsell. Na, na, they maun follow the camp, if she tak Morton.”

“That wad sort ill wi’ the auld leddy, to be sure,” said Cuddie; “she wad hardly win ower a lang day in the baggage-wain.”

“Then sic a flyting as there wad be between them, a’ about Whig and Tory,” continued Jenny.

“To be sure,” said Cuddie, “the auld leddy ‘s unto kittle in thae points.”

“And then, Cuddie,” continued his helpmate, who had reserved her strongest argument to the last, “if this marriage wi’ Lord Evandale is broken off, what comes o’ our ain bit free house, and the kale-yard, and the cow’s grass? I trow that baith us and thae bonny bairns will be turned on the wide warld!”

Here Jenny began to whimper; Cuddie writhed himself this way and that way, the very picture of indecision. At length he broke out, “Weel, woman, canna ye tell us what we suld do, without a’ this din about it?”

“Just do naething at a’,” said Jenny. “Never seem to ken onything about this gentleman, and for your life say a word that he suld hae been here, or up at the house! An I had kend, I wad hae gien him my ain bed, and sleepit in the byre or he had gane up by; but it canna be helpit now. The neist thing’s to get him cannily awa the morn, and I judge he’ll be in nae hurry to come back again.”

“My puir maister!” said Cuddie; “and maun I no speak to him, then?”

“For your life, no,” said Jenny. “Ye’re no obliged to ken him; and I wadna hae tauld ye, only I feared ye wad ken him in the morning.”

“Aweel,” said Cuddie, sighing heavily, “I ‘se awa to pleugh the outfield then; for if I am no to speak to him, I wad rather be out o’ the gate.”

“Very right, my dear hinny,” replied Jenny. “Naebody has better sense than you when ye crack a bit wi’ me ower your affairs; but ye suld ne’er do onything aff hand out o’ your ain head.”

“Ane wad think it’s true,” quoth Cuddie; “for I hae aye had some carline or quean or another to gar me gang their gate instead o’ my ain. There was first my mither,” he continued, as he undressed and tumbled himself into bed; “then there was Leddy Margaret didna let me ca’ my soul my ain; then my mither and her quarrelled, and pu’ed me twa ways at anes, as if ilk ane had an end o’ me, like Punch and the Deevil rugging about the Baker at the fair; and now I hae gotten a wife,” he murmured in continuation, as he stowed the blankets around his person, “and she’s like to tak the guiding o’ me a’ thegither.”

“And amna I the best guide ye ever had in a’ your life?” said Jenny, as she closed the conversation by assuming her place beside her husband and extinguishing the candle.

Leaving this couple to their repose, we have next to inform the reader that, early on the next morning, two ladies on horseback, attended by their servants, arrived at the house of Fairy Knowe, whom, to Jenny’s utter confusion, she instantly recognised as Miss Bellenden and Lady Emily Hamilton, a sister of Lord Evandale.

“Had I no better gang to the house to put things to rights?” said Jenny, confounded with this unexpected apparition.

“We want nothing but the pass-key,” said Miss Bellenden; “Gudyill will open the windows of the little parlour.”