Heather and Snow

CHAPTER IX

AT CASTLE WEELSET

Francie's anger had died down a good deal by the time he reached home. He was, as his father's friend had just said, by no means a bad sort of fellow, only he was full of himself, and therefore of little use to anybody. His mother and he, when not actually at strife, were constantly on the edge of a quarrel. The two must have their own way, each of them. Francie's way was sometimes good, his mother's sometimes not bad, but both were usually selfish. The boy had fits of generosity, the woman never, except toward her son. If she thought of something to please him, good and well! if he wanted anything of her, it would never do! The idea must be her own, or meet with no favour. If she imagined her son desired a thing, she felt it one she never could grant, and told him so: thereafter Francis would not rest until he had compassed the thing. Sudden division and high words would follow, with speechlessness on the mother's part in the rear, which might last for days. Becoming all at once tired of it, she would in the morning appear at breakfast looking as if nothing had ever come between them, and they would be the best of friends for a few days, or perhaps a week, seldom longer. Some fresh discord, nowise different in character from the preceding, would arise between them, and the same weary round be tramped again, each always in the right, and the other in the wrong. Every time they made it up, their relation seemed unimpaired, but it was hardly possible things should go on thus and not at length quite estrange their hearts.

In matters of display, to which Francis had much tendency, his mother's own vanity led her to indulge and spoil him, for, being hers, she was always pleased he should look his best. On his real self she neither had nor sought any influence. Insubordination or arrogance in him, her dignity unslighted, actually pleased her: she liked him to show his spirit: was it not a mark of his breeding?

She was a tall and rather stout woman, with a pretty, small-featured, regular face, and a thin nose with the nostrils pinched.

Castle Weelset was not much of a castle: to an ancient round tower, discomfortably habitable, had been added in the last century a rather large, defensible house. It stood on the edge of a gorge, crowning one of its stony hills of no great height. With scarce a tree to shelter it, the situation was very cold in winter, and it required a hardy breeding to live there in comfort. There was little of a garden, and the stables were somewhat ruinous. For the former fact the climate almost sufficiently accounted, and for the latter, a long period of comparative poverty.

The young laird did not like farming, and had no love for books: in this interval between school and college, he found very little to occupy him, and not much to amuse him. Had Kirsty and her family proved as encouraging as he had expected, he would have made use of his new pony almost only to ride to Corbyknowe in the morning and back to the castle at night.

His mother knew old Barclay, as she called him, well enough—that is, not at all, and had never shown him any cordiality, anything, indeed, better than condescension. To treat him like a gentleman, even when he sat at her own table, she would have counted absurd. He had never been to the castle since the day after her husband's funeral, when she received him with such emphasized superiority that he felt he could not go again without running the risk either of having his influence with the boy ruined, or giving occasion to a nature not without generosity to take David's part against his mother. Thenceforward, therefore, he contented himself with giving Francis invariable welcome, and doing what he could to make his visits pleasant. Chiefly, on such not infrequent occasions, the boy delighted in drawing from his father's friend what tales about his father, and adventures of their campaigns together, he had to tell; and in this way David's wife and children heard many things about himself which would not otherwise have reached them. Naturally, Kirsty and Francie grew to be good friends; and after they went to the parish school, there were few days indeed on which they did not walk at least as far homeward together as the midway divergence of their roads permitted. It was not wonderful, therefore, that at length Francis should be, or should fancy himself in love with Kirsty. But I believe all the time he thought of marrying her as a heroic deed, in raising the girl his mother despised to share the lofty position he and that foolish mother imagined him to occupy. The anticipation of opposition from his mother naturally strengthened his determination; of opposition on the part of Kirsty, he had not dreamed. He took it as of course that, the moment he stated his intention, Kirsty would be charmed, her mother more than pleased, and the stern old soldier overwhelmed with the honour of alliance with the son of his colonel. I do not doubt, however, that he had an affection for Kirsty far deeper and better than his notion of their relations to each other would indicate. Although it was mainly his pride that suffered in his humiliating dismissal, he had, I am sure, a genuine heartache as he galloped home. When he reached the castle, he left his pony to go where he would, and rushed to his room. There, locking the door that his mother might not enter, he threw himself on his bed in the luxurious consciousness of a much-wronged lover. An uneducated country girl, for as such he regarded her, had cast from her, not without insult, his splendidly generous offer of himself!

Poor king Cophetua did not, however, shed many tears for the loss of his recusant beggar-maid. By and by he forgot everything, found he had gone to sleep, and, endeavouring to weep again, did not succeed.

He grew hungry soon, and went down to see what was to be had. It was long past the usual hour for dinner, but Mrs. Gordon had not seen him return, and had had it put back—so to make the most of an opportunity of quarrel not to be neglected by a conscientious mother. She let it slide nevertheless.

'Gracious, you've been crying!' she exclaimed, the moment she saw him.

Now certainly Francis had not cried much; his eyes were, notwithstanding, a little red.

He had not yet learned to lie, but he might then have made his first assay had he had a fib at his tongue's end; as he had not, he gloomed deeper, and made no answer.

'You've been fighting!' said his mother.

'I haena,' he returned with rude indignation. 'Gien I had been, div ye think I wud hae grutten?'

'You forget yourself, laird!' remarked Mrs. Gordon, more annoyed with his Scotch than the tone of it. 'I would have you remember I am mistress of the house!'

'Till I marry, mother!' rejoined her son.

'Oblige me in the meantime,' she answered, 'by leaving vulgar language outside it.'

Francis was silent; and his mother, content with her victory, and in her own untruthfulness of nature believing he had indeed been fighting and had had the worse of it, said no more, but began to pity and pet him. A pot of his favourite jam presently consoled the love-wounded hero—in the acceptance of which consolation he showed himself far less unworthy than many a grown man, similarly circumstanced, in the choice of his.

CHAPTER X

DAVID AND FRANCIS

One day there was a market at a town some eight or nine miles off, and thither, for lack of anything else to do, Francis had gone to display himself and his pony, which he was riding with so tight a curb that the poor thing every now and then reared in protest against the agony he suffered.

On one of these occasions Don was on the point of falling backward, when a brown wrinkled hand laid hold of him by the head, half pulling the reins from his rider's hand, and ere he had quite settled again on his forelegs, had unhooked the chain of his curb, and fastened it some three links looser. Francis was more than indignant, even when he saw that the hand was Mr. Barclay's: was he to be treated as one who did not know what he was about!

'Hoots, my man!' said David gently, 'there's no occasion to put a water-chain upo' the bonny beastie: he has a mou like a leddy's! and to hae 't linkit up sae ticht is naething less nor tortur til 'im!—It's a won'er to me he hasna broken your banes and his ain back thegither, puir thing!' he added, patting and stroking the spirited little creature that stood sweating and trembling. 'I thank you, Mr. Barclay,' said Francis insolently, 'but I am quite able to manage the brute myself. You seem to take me for a fool!'

''Deed, he's no far aff ane 'at cud ca' a bonny cratur like that a brute!' returned David, nowise pleased to discover such hardness in one whom he would gladly treat like a child of his own. It was a great disappointment to him to see the lad getting farther away from the possibility of being helped by him. 'What 'ud yer father say to see ye illuse ony helpless bein! Yer father was awfu guid til 's horse-fowk.'

The last word was one of David's own: he was a great lover of animals.

'I'll do with my own as I please!' cried Francis, and spurred the pony to pass David. But one stalwart hand held the pony fast, while the other seized his rider by the ankle. The old man was now thoroughly angry with the graceless youth.

'God bless my sowl!' he cried, 'hae ye the spurs on as weel? Stick ane o' them intil him again, and I'll cast ye frae the seddle. I' the thick o' a fecht, the lang blades playin aboot yer father's heid like lichts i' the north, he never stack spur intil 's chairger needless!'

'I don't see,' said Francis, who had begun to cool down a little, 'how he could have enjoyed the fight much if he never forgot himself! I should forget everything in the delight of the battle!'

'Yer father, laddie, never forgot onything but himsel. Forgettin himsel left him free to min' a'thing forbye. Ye wud forget ilka thing but yer ain rage! Yer father was a great man as weel's a great soger, Francie, and a deevil to fecht, as his men said. I hae mysel seen by the set mou 'at the teeth war clinched i' the inside o' 't, whan a' the time on the broo o' 'im sat never a runkle. Gien ever there was a man 'at cud think o' twa things at ance, your father cud think o' three; and thae three war God, his enemy, and the beast aneath him. Francie, Francie, i' the name o' yer father I beg ye to regaird the richts o' the neebour ye sit upo'. Gien ye dinna that, ye'll come or lang to think little o' yer human neebour as weel, carin only for what ye get oot o' 'im!'

A voice inside Francis took part with the old man, and made him yet angrier. Also his pride was the worse annoyed that David Barclay, his tenant, should, in the hearing of two or three loafers gathered behind him, of whose presence the old man was unaware, not only rebuke him, but address him by his name, and the diminutive of it. So when David, in the appeal that burst from his enthusiastic remembrance of his officer in the battle-field, let the pony's head go, Francis dug his spurs in his sides, and darted off like an arrow. The old man for a moment stared open-mouthed after him. The fools around laughed: he turned and walked away, his head sunk on his breast.

Francis had not ridden far before he was vexed with himself. He was not so much sorry, as annoyed that he had behaved in fashion undignified. The thought that his childish behaviour would justify Kirsty in her opinion of him, added its sting. He tried to console himself with the reflection that the sort of thing ought to be put an end to at once: how far, otherwise, might not the old fellow's interference go! I am afraid he even said to himself that such was a consequence of familiarity with inferiors. Yet angry as he was at his fault-finding, he would have been proud of any approval from the lips of the old soldier. He rode his pony mercilessly for a mile or so, then pulled up, and began to talk pettingly to him, which I doubt if the little creature found consoling, for love only makes petting worth anything, and the love here was not much to the front.

About halfway home, he had to ford a small stream, or go round two miles by a bridge. There had been much rain in the night, and the stream was considerably swollen. As he approached the ford, he met a knife-grinder, who warned him not to attempt it: he had nearly lost his wheel in it, he said. But Francis always found it hard to accept advice. His mother had so often predicted from neglect of hers evils which never followed, that he had come to think counsel the one thing not to be heeded.

'Thank you,' he said; 'I think we can manage it!' and rode on.

When he reached the ford, where of all places he ought to have left the pony's head free, he foolishly remembered the curb-chain, and getting off, took it up a couple of links.

But when he remounted, whether from dread of the rush of the brown water, or resentment at the threat of renewed torture, the pony would not take the ford, and a battle royal arose between them, in which Francis was so far victorious that, after many attempts to run away, little Don, rendered desperate by the spur, dashed wildly into the stream, and went plunging on for two or three yards. Then he fell, and Francis found himself rolling in the water, swept along by the current.

A little way lower down, at a sharp turn of the stream under a high bank, was a deep pool, a place held much in dread by the country lads and lasses, being a haunt of the kelpie. Francis knew the spot well, and had good reason to fear that, carried into it, he must be drowned, for he could not swim. Roused by the thought to a yet harder struggle, he succeeded in getting upon his feet, and reaching the bank, where he lay for a while, exhausted. When at length he came to himself and rose, he found the water still between him and home, and nothing of his pony to be seen. If the youth's good sense had been equal to his courage, he would have been a fine fellow: he dashed straight into the ford, floundered through it, and lost his footing no more than had Don, treated properly. When he reached the high ground on the other side, he could still see nothing of him, and with sad heart concluded him carried into the Kelpie's Hole, never more to be beheld alive:—what would his mother and Mr. Barclay say? Shivering and wretched, and with a growing compunction in regard to his behaviour to Don, he crawled wearily home.

Don, however, had at no moment been much in danger. Rid of his master, he could take very good care of himself. He got to the bank without difficulty, and took care it should be on the home-side of the stream. Not once looking behind him after his tyrant, he set off at a good round trot, much refreshed by his bath, and rejoicing in the thought of his loose box at castle Weelset.

In a narrow part of the road, however, he overtook a cart of Mr. Barclay's; and as he attempted to pass between it and the steep brae, the man on the shaft caught at his bridle, made him prisoner, tied him to the cart behind, and took him to Corbyknowe. When David came home and saw him, he conjectured pretty nearly what had happened, and tired as he was set out for the castle. Had he not feared that Francis might have been injured, he would not have cared to go, much as he knew it must relieve him to learn that his pony was safe.

Mrs. Gordon declined to see David, but he ascertained from the servants that Francis had come home half-drowned, leaving Don in the Kelpie's Hole.

David hesitated a little whether or not to punish him for his behaviour to the pony by allowing him to remain in ignorance of his safety, and so leaving him to the agen-bite of conscience; but concluding that such was not his part, he told them that the animal was safe at Corbyknowe, and went home again.

But he wanted Francis to fetch the pony himself, therefore did not send him, and in the meantime fed and groomed him with his own hands as if he had been his friend's charger. Francis having just enough of the grace of shame to make him shrink from going to Corbyknowe, his mother wrote to David, asking why he did not send home the animal. David, one of the most courteous of men, would take no order from any but his superior officer, and answered that he would gladly give him up to the young laird in person.

The next day Mrs. Gordon drove, in what state she could muster, to Corbyknowe. Arrived there, she declined to leave her carriage, requesting Mrs. Barclay, who came to the door, to send her husband to her. Mrs. Barclay thought it better to comply.

David came in his shirt-sleeves, for he had been fetched from his work.

'If I understand your answer to my request, Mr. Barclay, you decline to send back Mr. Gordon's pony. Pray, on what grounds?'

'I wrote, ma'am, that I should be glad to give him over to Mr. Francis himself.'

'Mr. Gordon does not find it convenient to come all this way on foot. In fact he declines to do it, and requests that you will send the pony home this afternoon.'

'Excuse me, mem, but it's surely enough done that a man make known the presence o' strays, and tak proper care o' them until they're claimt! I was fain forbye to gie the bonny thing a bit pleesur in life: Francie's ower hard upon him.'

'You forget, David Barclay, that Mr. Gordon is your landlord!'

'His father, mem, was my landlord, and his father's father was my father's landlord; and the interests o' the landlord hae aye been oors. Ither nor Francie's herty freen I can never be!'

'You presume on my late husband's kindness to you, Barclay!'

'Gien devotion be presumption, mem, I presume. Archibald Gordon was and is my freen, and will be for ever. We hae been throuw ower muckle thegither to change to are anither. It was for his sake and the laddie's ain that I wantit him to come to me. I wantit a word wi' him aboot that powny o' his. He'll never be true man 'at taks no tent (care) o' dumb animals! You 'at's sae weel at hame i' the seddle yersel, mem, micht tak a kin'ly care o' what's aneth his!'

'I will have no one interfere with my son. I am quite capable of teaching him his duty myself.'

'His father requestit me to do what I could for him, mem.'

'His late father, if you please, Barclay!'

'He s' never be Francie's late father to Francie, gien I can help it, mem! He may be your late husband, mem, but he's my cornel yet, and I s' keep my word til him! It'll no be lang noo, i' the natur o' things, till I gang til him; and sure am I his first word 'll be aboot the laddie: I wud ill like to answer him, "Archie, I ken naething aboot him but what I cud weel wuss itherwise!" Hoo wud ye like to gie sic an answer yersel, mem?'

'I'm surprised at a man of your sense, Barclay, thinking we shall know one another in heaven! We shall have to be content with God there!'

'I said naething about h'aven, mem! Fowk may ken are anither and no be in ae place. I took note i' the kirk last Sunday 'at Abrahaam kent the rich man, and the rich man him, and they warna i' the same place.—But ye'll lat the yoong laird come and see me, mem?' concluded David, changing his tone and speaking as one who begged a favour; for the thought of meeting his old friend and having nothing to tell him about his boy, quenched his pride.

'Home, Thomas!' cried her late husband's wife to her coachman, and drove away.

'Dod! they'll hae to gie that wife a hell til hersel!' said David, turning to the door discomfited.

'And maybe she'll no like it whan she hes't!' returned his wife, who had heard every word. 'There's fowk 'at's no fit company for onybody! and I'm thinkin she's ane gien there bena anither!'

'I'll sen' Jeamie hame wi' the powny the nicht,' said David. 'A body canna insist whaur fowk are no frien's. That weud grow to enmity, and the en' o' a' guid. Na, we maun sen' hame the powny; and gien there be ony grace i' the bairn, he canna but come and say thank ye!'

Mrs. Gordon rejoiced in her victory; but David's yielding showed itself the true policy. Francis did call and thank him for taking care of Don. He even granted that perhaps he had been too hard on the pony.

'Ye cud richteously expeck naething o' a powny o' his size that that powny o' yours cudna du, Francie!' said David. 'But, in God's name, dear laddie, be a richteous man. Gien ye requere no more than's fair frae man or beast, ye'll maistly aye get it. But gien yer ootluik in life be to get a'thing and gie naething, ye maun come to grief ae w'y and a' w'ys. Success in an ill attemp is the warst failyie a man can mak.'

But it was talking to the wind, for Francis thought, or tried to think David only bent, like his mother, on finding fault with him. He made haste to get away, and left his friend with a sad heart.

He rode on to the foot of the Horn, to the spot where Kirsty was usually at that season to be found; but she saw him coming, and went up the hill. Soon after, his mother contrived that he should pay a visit to some relatives in the south, and for a time neither the castle nor the Horn saw anything of him. Without returning home he went in the winter to Edinburgh, where he neither disgraced nor distinguished himself. David was to hear no ill of him. To be beyond his mother's immediate influence was perhaps to his advantage, but as nothing superior was substituted, it was at best but little gain. His companions were like himself, such as might turn to worse or better, no one could tell which.

CHAPTER XI

KIRSTY AND PHEMY

During the first winter which Francis spent at college, his mother was in England, and remained there all the next summer and winter. When at last she came home, she was even less pleasant than before in the eyes of her household, no one of which had ever loved her. Throughout the summer she had a succession of visitors, and stories began to spread concerning strange doings at the castle. The neighbours talked of extravagance, and the censorious among them of riotous living; while some of the servants more than hinted that the amount of wine and whisky consumed was far in excess of what served when the old colonel was alive.