"Alan," cried I, "they're all rogues and liars, and I'm with ye there.
The more reason there should be one decent man in such a land of
thieves! My word is passed, and I'll stick to it. I said long syne to
your kinswoman that I would stumble at no risk. Do ye mind of that?--the
night Red Colin fell, it was. No more I will, then. Here I stop.
Prestongrange promised me my life; if he's to be mansworn, here I'll
have to die."

"Aweel, aweel," said Alan.

All this time we had seen or heard no more of our pursuers. In truth we
had caught them unawares; their whole party (as I was to learn
afterwards) had not yet reached the scene; what there was of them was
spread among the bents towards Gillane. It was quite an affair to call
them in and bring them over, and the boat was making speed. They were
besides but cowardly fellows: a mere leash of Highland cattle thieves,
of several clans, no gentleman there to be the captain: and the more
they looked at Alan and me upon the beach, the less (I must suppose)
they liked the looks of us.

Whoever had betrayed Alan it was not the captain: he was in the skiff
himself, steering and stirring up his oarsmen, like a man with his heart
in his employ. Already he was near in, and the boat scouring--already
Alan's face had flamed crimson with the excitement of his deliverance,
when our friends in the bents, either in despair to see their prey
escape them or with some hope of scaring Andie, raised suddenly a shrill
cry of several voices.

This sound, arising from what appeared to be a quite deserted coast, was
really very daunting, and the men in the boat held water instantly.

"What's this of it?" sings out the captain, for he was come within an
easy hail.

"Freens o' mine," says Alan, and began immediately to wade forth in the
shallow water towards the boat. "Davie," he said, pausing, "Davie, are
ye no coming? I am swier to leave ye."

"Not a hair of me," said I.

He stood part of a second where he was to his knees in the salt water,
hesitating.

"He that will to Cupar, maun to Cupar," said he, and swashing in deeper
than his waist, was hauled into the skiff, which was immediately
directed for the ship.

I stood where he had left me, with my hands behind my back; Alan sat
with his head turned watching me; and the boat drew smoothly away. Of a
sudden I came the nearest hand to shedding tears, and seemed to myself
the most deserted, solitary lad in Scotland. With that I turned my back
upon the sea and faced the sand hills. There was no sight or sound of
man; the sun shone on the wet sand and the dry, the wind blew in the
bents, the gulls made a dreary piping. As I passed higher up the beach,
the sand-lice were hopping nimbly about the stranded tangles. The devil
any other sight or sound in that unchancy place. And yet I knew there
were folk there, observing me, upon some secret purpose. They were no
soldiers, or they would have fallen on and taken us ere now; doubtless
they were some common rogues hired for my undoing, perhaps to kidnap,
perhaps to murder me outright. From the position of those engaged, the
first was the more likely; from what I knew of their character and
ardency in this business, I thought the second very possible; and the
blood ran cold about my heart.

I had a mad idea to loosen my sword in the scabbard; for though I was
very unfit to stand up like a gentleman blade to blade, I thought I
could do some scathe in a random combat. But I perceived in time the
folly of resistance. This was no doubt the joint "expedient" on which
Prestongrange and Fraser were agreed. The first, I was very sure, had
done something to secure my life; the second was pretty likely to have
slipped in some contrary hints into the ears of Neil and his companions;
and if I were to show bare steel I might play straight into the hands of
my worst enemy and seal my own doom.

These thoughts brought me to the head of the beach. I cast a look
behind, the boat was nearing the brig, and Alan flew his handkerchief
for a farewell, which I replied to with the waving of my hand. But Alan
himself was shrunk to a small thing in my view, alongside of this pass
that lay in front of me. I set my hat hard on my head, clenched my
teeth, and went right before me up the face of the sand-wreath. It made
a hard climb, being steep, and the sand like water underfoot. But I
caught hold at last by the long bent grass on the brae-top, and pulled
myself to a good footing. The same moment men stirred and stood up here
and there, six or seven of them, ragged-like knaves, each with a dagger
in his hand. The fair truth is, I shut my eyes and prayed. When I opened
them again, the rogues were crept the least thing nearer without speech
or hurry. Every eye was upon mine, which struck me with a strange
sensation of their brightness, and of the fear with which they continued
to approach me. I held out my hands empty: whereupon one asked, with a
strong Highland brogue, if I surrendered.

"Under protest," said I, "if ye ken what that means, which I misdoubt."

At that word, they came all in upon me like a flight of birds upon a
carrion, seized me, took my sword, and all the money from my pockets,
bound me hand and foot with some strong line, and cast me on a tussock
of bent. There they sat about their captive in a part of a circle and
gazed upon him silently like something dangerous, perhaps a lion or a
tiger on the spring. Presently this attention was relaxed. They drew
nearer together, fell to speech in the Gaelic, and very cynically
divided my property before my eyes. It was my diversion in this time
that I could watch from my place the progress of my friend's escape. I
saw the boat come to the brig and be hoisted in, the sails fill, and the
ship pass out seaward behind the isles and by North Berwick.

In the course of two hours or so, more and more ragged Highlandmen kept
collecting, Neil among the first, until the party must have numbered
near a score. With each new arrival there was a fresh bout of talk, that
sounded like complaints and explanations; but I observed one thing, none
of those that came late had any share in the division of my spoils. The
last discussion was very violent and eager, so that once I thought they
would have quarrelled; on the heels of which their company parted, the
bulk of them returning westward in a troop, and only three, Neil and two
others, remaining sentries on the prisoner.

"I could name one who would be very ill pleased with your day's work,
Neil Duncanson," said I, when the rest had moved away.

He assured me in answer I should be tenderly used, for he knew he was
"acquent wi' the leddy."

This was all our talk, nor did any other son of man appear upon that
portion of the coast until the sun had gone down among the Highland
mountains, and the gloaming was beginning to grow dark. At which hour I
was aware of a long, lean, bony-like Lothian man of a very swarthy
countenance, that came towards us among the bents on a farm horse.

"Lads," cried he, "hae ye a paper like this?" and held up one in his
hand. Neil produced a second, which the new comer studied through a pair
of horn spectacles, and saying all was right and we were the folk he was
seeking, immediately dismounted. I was then set in his place, my feet
tied under the horse's belly, and we set forth under the guidance of the
Lowlander. His path must have been very well chosen, for we met but one
pair--a pair of lovers--the whole way, and these, perhaps taking us to
be free-traders, fled on our approach. We were at one time close at the
foot of Berwick Law on the south side; at another, as we passed over
some open hills, I spied the lights of a clachan and the old tower of a
church among some trees not far off, but too far to cry for help, if I
had dreamed of it. At last we came again within sound of the sea. There
was moonlight, though not much; and by this I could see the three huge
towers and broken battlements of Tantallon, that old chief place of the
Red Douglases. The horse was picketed in the bottom of the ditch to
graze, and I was led within, and forth into the court, and thence into a
tumble-down stone hall. Here my conductors built a brisk fire in the
midst of the pavement, for there was a chill in the night. My hands were
loosed, I was set by the wall in the inner end, and (the Lowlander
having produced provisions) I was given oatmeal bread and a pitcher of
French brandy. This done, I was left once more alone with my three
Highlandmen. They sat close by the fire drinking and talking; the wind
blew in by the breaches, cast about the smoke and flames, and sang in
the tops of the towers; I could hear the sea under the cliffs, and my
mind being reassured as to my life, and my body and spirits wearied with
the day's employment, I turned upon one side and slumbered.

I had no means of guessing at what hour I was wakened, only the moon was
down and the fire low. My feet were now loosed, and I was carried
through the ruins and down the cliff-side by a precipitous path to where
I found a fisher's boat in a haven of the rocks. This I was had on board
of, and we began to put forth from the shore in a fine starlight.

       *       *       *       *       *




CHAPTER XIV

THE BASS


I had no thought where they were taking me; only looked here and there
for the appearance of a ship; and there ran the while in my head a word
of Ransome's--the _twenty-pounders_. If I were to be exposed a second
time to that same former danger of the plantations, I judged it must
turn ill with me; there was no second Alan, and no second shipwreck and
spare yard to be expected now; and I saw myself hoe tobacco under the
whip's lash. The thought chilled me; the air was sharp upon the water,
the stretchers of the boat drenched with a cold dew; and I shivered in
my place beside the steersman. This was the dark man whom I have called
hitherto the Lowlander; his name was Dale, ordinarily called Black
Andie. Feeling the thrill of my shiver, he very kindly handed me a rough
jacket full of fish-scales, with which I was glad to cover myself.

"I thank you for this kindness," said I, "and will make so free as to
repay it with a warning. You take a high responsibility in this affair.
You are not like these ignorant, barbarous Highlanders, but know what
the law is and the risks of those that break it."

"I am no just exactly what ye would ca' an extremist for the law," says
he, "at the best of times; but in this business I act with a good
warranty."

"What are you going to do with me?" I asked.

"Nae harm," said he, "nae harm ava'. Ye'll hae strong freens, I'm
thinking. Ye'll be richt eneuch yet."

There began to fall a greyness on the face of the sea; little dabs of
pink and like coals of slow fire came in the east; and at the same time
the geese awakened, and began crying about the top of the Bass. It is
just the one crag of rock, as everybody knows, but great enough to carve
a city from. The sea was extremely little, but there went a hollow
plowter round the base of it. With the growing of the dawn I could see
it clearer and clearer; the straight crags painted with sea-birds'
droppings like a morning frost, the sloping top of it green with grass,
the clan of white geese that cried about the sides, and the black,
broken buildings of the prison sitting close on the sea's edge.

At the sight the truth came in upon me in a clap.

"It's there you're taking me!" I cried.

"Just to the Bass, mannie," said he: "whaur the auld sants were afore
ye, and I misdoubt if ye have come so fairly by your preeson."

"But none dwells there now," I cried; "the place is long a ruin."

"It'll be the mair pleisand a change for the solan geese, then," quoth
Andie dryly.

The day coming slowly brighter I observed on the bilge, among the big
stones with which fisherfolk ballast their boats, several kegs and
baskets, and a provision of fuel. All these were discharged upon the
crag. Andie, myself, and my three Highlanders (I call them mine,
although it was the other way about), landed along with them. The sun
was not yet up when the boat moved away again, the noise of the oars on
the thole-pins echoing from the cliffs, and left us in our singular
reclusion.

Andie Dale was the Prefect (as I would jocularly call him) of the Bass,
being at once the shepherd and the gamekeeper of that small and rich
estate. He had to mind the dozen or so of sheep that fed and fattened on
the grass of the sloping part of it, like beasts grazing the roof of a
cathedral. He had charge besides of the solan geese that roosted in the
crags; and from these an extraordinary income is derived. The young are
dainty eating, as much as two shillings a-piece being a common price,
and paid willingly by epicures; even the grown birds are valuable for
their oil and feathers; and a part of the minister's stipend of North
Berwick is paid to this day in solan geese, which makes it (in some
folks' eyes) a parish to be coveted. To perform these several
businesses, as well as to protect the geese from poachers, Andie had
frequent occasion to sleep and pass days together on the crag; and we
found the man at home there like a farmer in his steading. Bidding us
all shoulder some of the packages, a matter in which I made haste to
bear a hand, he led us in by a locked gate, which was the only admission
to the island, and through the ruins of the fortress, to the governor's
house. There we saw, by the ashes in the chimney and a standing
bed-place in one corner, that he made his usual occupation.

This bed he now offered me to use, saying he supposed I would set up to
be gentry.

"My gentrice has nothing to do with where I lie," said I. "I bless God I
have lain hard ere now, and can do the same again with thankfulness.
While I am here, Mr. Andie, if that be your name, I will do my part and
take my place beside the rest of you; and I ask you on the other hand to
spare me your mockery, which I own I like ill."

He grumbled a little at this speech, but seemed upon reflection to
approve it. Indeed, he was a long-headed, sensible man, and a good Whig
and Presbyterian; read daily in a pocket Bible, and was both able and
eager to converse seriously on religion, leaning more than a little
towards the Cameronian extremes. His morals were of a more doubtful
colour. I found he was deep in the free trade, and used the ruins of
Tantallon for a magazine of smuggled merchandise. As for a gauger, I do
not believe he valued the life of one at half-a-farthing. But that part
of the coast of Lothian is to this day as wild a place, and the commons
there as rough a crew as any in Scotland.

One incident of my imprisonment is made memorable by a consequence it
had long after. There was a warship at this time stationed in the Firth,
the _Seahorse_, Captain Palliser. It chanced she was cruising in the
month of September, plying between Fife and Lothian, and sounding for
sunk dangers. Early one fine morning she was seen about two miles to
east of us, where she lowered a boat, and seemed to examine the Wildfire
Rocks and Satan's Bush, famous dangers of that coast. And presently,
after having got her boat again, she came before the wind and was headed
directly for the Bass. This was very troublesome to Andie and the
Highlanders; the whole business of my sequestration was designed for
privacy, and here, with a navy captain perhaps blundering ashore, it
looked to become public enough, if it were nothing worse. I was in a
minority of one, I am no Alan to fall upon so many, and I was far from
sure that a warship was the least likely to improve my condition. All
which considered, I gave Andie my parole of good behaviour and
obedience, and was had briskly to the summit of the rock, where we all
lay down, at the cliff's edge, in different places of observation and
concealment. The _Seahorse_ came straight on till I thought she would
have struck, and we (looking giddily down) could see the ship's company
at their quarters and hear the leadsman singing at the lead. Then she
suddenly wore and let fly a volley of I know not how many great guns.
The rock was shaken with the thunder of the sound, the smoke flowed over
our heads, and the geese rose in number beyond computation or belief. To
hear their screaming and to see the twinkling of their wings, made a
most inimitable curiosity: and I suppose it was after this somewhat
childish pleasure that Captain Palliser had come so near the Bass. He
was to pay dear for it in time. During his approach I had the
opportunity to make a remark upon the rigging of that ship by which I
ever after knew it miles away; and this was a means (under Providence)
of my averting from a friend a great calamity, and inflicting on Captain
Palliser himself a sensible disappointment.

All the time of my stay on the rock we lived well. We had small ale and
brandy, and oatmeal of which we made our porridge night and morning. At
times a boat came from the Castleton and brought us a quarter of mutton,
for the sheep upon the rock we must not touch, these being specially fed
to market. The geese were unfortunately out of season, and we let them
be. We fished ourselves, and yet more often made the geese to fish for
us: observing one when he had made a capture and scaring him from his
prey ere he had swallowed it.

The strange nature of this place, and the curiosities with which it
abounded, held me busy and amused. Escape being impossible, I was
allowed my entire liberty, and continually explored the surface of the
isle wherever it might support the foot of man. The old garden of the
prison was still to be observed, with flowers and pot-herbs running
wild, and some ripe cherries on a bush. A little lower stood a chapel or
a hermit's cell; who built or dwelt in it, none may know, and the
thought of its age made a ground of many meditations. The prison too,
where I now bivouacked with Highland cattle thieves, was a place full of
history, both human and divine. I thought it strange so many saints and
martyrs should have gone by there so recently, and left not so much as a
leaf out of their Bibles, or a name carved upon the wall, while the
rough soldier lads that mounted guard upon the battlements had filled
the neighbourhood with their mementoes--broken tobacco-pipes for the
most part, and that in a surprising plenty, but also metal buttons from
their coats. There were times when I thought I could have heard the
pious sound of psalms out of the martyrs' dungeons, and seen the
soldiers tramp the ramparts with their glinting pipes, and the dawn
rising behind them out of the North Sea.

No doubt it was a good deal Andie and his tales that put these fancies
in my head. He was extraordinary well acquainted with the story of the
rock in all particulars, down to the names of private soldiers, his
father having served there in that same capacity. He was gifted besides
with a natural genius for narration, so that the people seemed to speak
and the things to be done before your face. This gift of his and my
assiduity to listen brought us the more close together. I could not
honestly deny but what I liked him; I soon saw that he liked me; and
indeed, from the first I had set myself out to capture his good will. An
odd circumstance (to be told presently) effected this beyond my
expectation; but even in early days we made a friendly pair to be a
prisoner and his gaoler.

I should trifle with my conscience if I pretended my stay upon the Bass
was wholly disagreeable. It seemed to me a safe place, as though I was
escaped there out of my troubles. No harm was to be offered me; a
material impossibility, rock and the deep sea, prevented me from fresh
attempts; I felt I had my life safe and my honour safe, and there were
times when I allowed myself to gloat on them like stolen waters. At
other times my thoughts were very different. I recalled how strong I had
expressed myself both to Rankeillor and to Stewart; I reflected that my
captivity upon the Bass, in view of a great part of the coasts of Fife
and Lothian, was a thing I should be thought more likely to have
invented than endured; and in the eyes of these two gentlemen, at least,
I must pass for a boaster and a coward. Now I would take this lightly
enough; tell myself that so long as I stood well with Catriona Drummond,
the opinion of the rest of man was but moonshine and spilled water; and
thence pass off into those meditations of a lover which are so
delightful to himself and must always appear so surprisingly idle to a
reader. But anon the fear would take me otherwise; I would be shaken
with a perfect panic of self-esteem, and these supposed hard judgments
appear an injustice impossible to be supported. With that another train
of thought would be presented, and I had scarce begun to be concerned
about men's judgments of myself, than I was haunted with the remembrance
of James Stewart in his dungeon and the lamentations of his wife. Then,
indeed, passion began to work in me; I could not forgive myself to sit
there idle; it seemed (if I were a man at all) that I could fly or swim
out of my place of safety; and it was in such humours and to amuse my
self-reproaches that I would set the more particularly to win the good
side of Andie Dale.

At last, when we two were alone on the summit of the rock on a bright
morning, I put in some hint about a bribe. He looked at me, cast back
his head, and laughed out loud.

"Ay, you're funny, Mr. Dale," said I, "but perhaps if you glance an eye
upon that paper you may change your note."

The stupid Highlanders had taken from me at the time of my seizure
nothing but hard money, and the paper I now showed Andie was an
acknowledgment from the British Linen Company for a considerable sum.

He read it. "Troth, and ye're nane sae ill aff," said he.

"I thought that would maybe vary your opinions," said I.

"Hout!" said he. "It shaws me ye can bribe; but I'm no to be bribit."

"We'll see about that yet a while," says I. "And first, I'll show you
that I know what I am talking. You have orders to detain me here till
Thursday, 21st September."

"Ye're no a'thegether wrong either," says Andie. "I'm to let ye gang,
bar orders contrair, on Saturday, the 23rd."

I could not but feel there was something extremely insidious in this
arrangement. That I was to reappear precisely in time to be too late
would cast the more discredit on my tale, if I were minded to tell one;
and this screwed me to fighting point.

"Now then, Andie, you that kens the world, listen to me, and think while
ye listen," said I. "I know there are great folks in the business, and I
make no doubt you have their names to go upon. I have seen some of them
myself since this affair began, and said my say into their faces too.
But what kind of a crime would this be that I had committed? or what
kind of a process is this that I am fallen under? To be apprehended by
some ragged John-Hielandmen on August 30th, carried to a rickle of old
stones that is now neither fort nor gaol (whatever it once was) but just
the gamekeeper's lodge of the Bass Rock, and set free again, September
23d, as secretly as I was first arrested--does that sound like law to
you? or does it sound like justice? or does it not sound honestly like a
piece of some low dirty intrigue, of which the very folk that meddle
with it are ashamed?"

"I canna gainsay ye, Shaws. It looks unco underhand," says Andie. "And
werenae the folk guid sound Whigs and true-blue Presbyterians I would
hae seen them ayont Jordan and Jeroozlem or I would have set hand to
it."

"The Master of Lovat'll be a braw Whig," says I, "and a grand
Presbyterian."

"I ken naething by him," said he. "I hae nae trokings wi' Lovats."

"No, it'll be Prestongrange that you'll be dealing with," said I.

"Ah, but I'll no tell ye that," said Andie.

"Little need when I ken," was my retort.

"There's just the ae thing ye can be fairly sure of, Shaws," says Andie.
"And that is that (try as ye please) I'm no dealing wi' yoursel'; nor
yet I amnae goin' to," he added.

"Well, Andie, I see I'll have to be speak out plain with you," I
replied. And I told him so much as I thought needful of the facts.

He heard me out with serious interest, and when I had done, seemed to
consider a little with himself.

"Shaws," said he at last, "I deal with the naked hand. It's a queer
tale, and no vary creditable, the way you tell it; and I'm far frae
minting that is other than the way that ye believe it. As for yoursel',
ye seems to me rather a dacent-like young man. But me, that's aulder and
mair judeecious, see perhaps a wee bit further forrit in the job than
what ye can dae. And here is the maitter clear and plain to ye. There'll
be nae skaith to yoursel' if I keep ye here; far frae that, I think
ye'll be a hantle better by it. There'll be nae skaith to the
kintry--just ae mair Hielantman hangit--Gude kens, a guid riddance! On
the ither hand it would be considerable skaith to me if I would let you
free. Sae, speakin' as a guid Whig, an honest freen' to you, and an
anxious freen' to my ainsel', the plain fact is that I think ye'll just
have to bide here wi' Andie an' the solans."

"Andie," said I, laying my hand upon his knee, "this Hielantman's
innocent."

"Ay, it's a peety about that," said he. "But ye see in this warld, the
way God made it, we cannae just get a'thing that we want."

       *       *       *       *       *




CHAPTER XV

BLACK ANDIE'S TALE OF TOD LAPRAIK


I have yet said little of the Highlanders. They were all three of the
followers of James More, which bound the accusation very tight about
their master's neck. All understood a word or two of English; but Neil
was the only one who judged he had enough of it for general converse, in
which (when once he got embarked) his company was often tempted to the
contrary opinion. They were tractable, simple creatures; showed much
more courtesy than might have been expected from their raggedness and
their uncouth appearance, and fell spontaneously to be like three
servants for Andie and myself.

Dwelling in that isolated place, in the old falling ruins of a prison,
and among endless strange sounds of the sea and the sea-birds, I thought
I perceived in them early the effects of superstitious fear. When there
was nothing doing they would either lie and sleep, for which their
appetite appeared insatiable, or Neil would entertain the others with
stories which seemed always of a terrifying strain. If neither of these
delights were within reach--if perhaps two were sleeping and the third
could find no means to follow their example--I would see him sit and
listen and look about him in a progression of uneasiness, starting, his
face blenching, his hands clutched, a man strung like a bow. The nature
of these fears I had never an occasion to find out, but the sight of
them was catching, and the nature of the place that we were in
favourable to alarms. I can find no word for it in the English, but
Andie had an expression for it in the Scots from which he never varied.

"Ay," he would say, "_it's an unco place, the Bass_." It is so I always
think of it. It was an unco place by night, unco by day; and these were
unco sounds, of the calling of the solans, and the plash of the sea and
the rock echoes, that hung continually in our ears. It was chiefly so in
moderate weather. When the waves were anyway great they roared about the
rock like thunder and the drums of armies, dreadful but merry to hear;
and it was in the calm days that a man could daunt himself with
listening--not a Highlandman only, as I several times experimented on
myself, so many still, hollow noises haunted and reverberated in the
porches of the rock.

This brings me to a story I heard, and a scene I took part in, which
quite changed our terms of living, and had a great effect on my
departure. It chanced one night I fell in a muse beside the fire and
(that little air of Alan's coming back to my memory) began to whistle. A
hand was laid upon my arm, and the voice of Neil bade me to stop, for it
was not "canny musics."

"Not canny?" I asked. "How can that be?"

"Na," said he; "it will be made by a bogle and her wanting ta heid upon
his body."[13]

"Well," said I, "there can be no bogles here, Neil; for it's not likely
they would fash themselves to frighten solan geese."

"Ay?" says Andie, "is that what ye think of it? But I'll can tell ye
there's been waur nor bogles here."

"What's waur than bogles, Andie?" said I.

"Warlocks," said he. "Or a warlock at the least of it. And that's a
queer tale, too," he added. "And if ye would like, I'll tell it ye."

To be sure we were all of the one mind, and even the Highlander that had
the least English of the three set himself to listen with all his might.


THE TALE OF TOD LAPRAIK

My faither, Tam Dale, peace to his banes, was a wild, sploring lad in
his young days, wi' little wisdom and less grace. He was fond of a lass
and fond of a glass, and fond of a ran-dan; but I could never hear tell
that he was muckle use for honest employment. Frae ae thing to anither,
he listed at last for a sodger and was in the garrison of this fort,
which was the first way that ony of the Dales cam to set foot upon the
Bass. Sorrow upon that service! The governor brewed his ain ale; it
seems it was the warst conceivable. The rock was proveesioned frae the
shore with vivers, the thing was ill-guided, and there were whiles when
they but to fish and shoot solans for their diet. To crown a', thir was
the Days of the Persecution. The perishin' cauld chalmers were all
occupeed wi' sants and martyrs, the saut of the yearth, of which it
wasnae worthy. And though Tam Dale carried a firelock there, a single
sodger, and liked a lass and a glass, as I was sayin', the mind of the
man was mair just than set with his position. He had glints of the glory
of the kirk; there were whiles when his dander rase to see the Lord's
sants misguided, and shame covered him that he should be haulding a
can'le (or carrying a firelock) in so black a business. There were
nights of it when he was here on sentry, the place a' wheesht, the
frosts o' winter maybe riving in the wa's, and he would hear are o' the
prisoners strike up a psalm, and the rest join in, and the blessed
sounds rising from the different chalmers--or dungeons, I would raither
say--so that this auld craig in the sea was like a pairt of Heev'n.
Black shame was on his saul; his sins hove up before him muckle as the
Bass, and above a', that chief sin, that he should have a hand in
hagging and hashing at Christ's Kirk. But the truth is that he resisted
the spirit. Day cam, there were the rousing companions, and his guid
resolves depairtit.

In thir days, dwalled upon the Bass a man of God, Peden the Prophet was
his name. Ye'll have heard tell of Prophet Peden. There was never the
wale of him sinsyne, and it's a question wi' mony if there ever was his
like afore. He was wild 's a peat-hag, fearsome to look at, fearsome to
hear, his face like the day of judgment. The voice of him was like a
solan's and dinnle'd in folks' lugs, and the words of him like coals of
fire.

Now there was a lass on the rock, and I think she had little to do, for
it was nae place far dacent weemen; but it seems she was bonny, and her
and Tam Dale were very well agreed. It befell that Peden was in the
gairden his lane at the praying when Tam and the lass cam by; and what
should the lassie do but mock with laughter at the sant's devotions? He
rose and lookit at the twa o' them, and Tam's knees knoitered thegether
at the look of him. But whan he spak, it was mair in sorrow than in
anger. "Poor thing, poor thing!" says he, and it was the lass he lookit
at. "I hear you skirl and laugh," he says, "but the Lord has a deid shot
prepared for you, and at that surprising judgment ye shall skirl but the
ae time!" Shortly thereafter she was daundering on the craigs wi'
twa-three sodgers, and it was a blawy day. There cam a gowst of wind,
claught her by the coats, and awa' wi' her bag and baggage. And it was
remarked by the sodgers that she gied but the ae skirl.

Nae doubt this judgment had some weicht upon Tam Dale; but it passed
again and him none the better. Ae day he was flyting wi' anither
sodger-lad. "Deil hae me!" quo' Tam, for he was a profane swearer. And
there was Peden glowering at him, gash an' waefu'; Peden wi' his lang
chafts an' luntin' een, the maud happed about his kist, and the hand of
him held out wi' the black nails upon the finger-nebs--for he had nae
care of the body. "Fy, fy, poor man!" cries he, "the poor fool man!
_Deil hae me_, quo' he; an' I see the deil at his oxter." The conviction
of guilt and grace cam in on Tam like the deep sea; he flang doun the
pike that was in his hands--"I will nae mair lift arms against the cause
o' Christ!" says he, and was as gude's word. There was a sair fyke in
the beginning, but the governor, seeing him resolved, gied him his
dischairge, and he went and dwallt and merried in North Berwick, and had
aye a gude name with honest folk frae that day on.

It was in the year seeventeen hunner and sax that the Bass cam in the
hands o' the Da'rymples, and there was twa men soucht the chairge of it.
Baith were weel qualified, for they had baith been sodgers in the
garrison, and kent the gate to handle solans, and the seasons and values
of them. Forby that they were baith--or they baith seemed--earnest
professors and men of comely conversation. The first of them was just
Tam Dale, my faither. The second was ane Lapraik, whom the folk ca'd Tod
Lapraik maistly, but whether for his name or his nature I could never
hear tell. Weel, Tam gaed to see Lapraik upon this business, and took
me, that was a toddlin' laddie, by the hand. Tod had his dwallin' in the
lang loan benorth the kirkyaird. It's a dark uncanny loan, forby that
the kirk has aye had an ill name since the days o' James the Saxt and
the deevil's cantrips played therein when the Queen was on the seas; and
as for Tod's house, it was in the mirkest end, and was little liked by
some that kenned the best. The door was on the sneck that day, and me
and my faither gaed straucht in. Tod was a wabster to his trade; his
loom stood in the but. There he sat, a muckle fat, white hash of a man
like creish, wi' a kind of a holy smile that gart me scunner. The hand
of him aye cawed the shuttle, but his een was steeked. We cried to him
by his name, we skirled in the deid lug of him, we shook him by the
shou'ther. Nae mainner o' service! There he sat on his dowp, an' cawed
the shuttle and smiled like creish.

"God be guid to us," says Tam Dale, "this is no canny!"

He had jimp said the word, when Tod Lapraik cam to himsel'.

"Is this you, Tam?" says he. "Haith, man! I'm blythe to see ye. I whiles
fa' into a bit dwam like this," he says; "it's frae the stamach."

Weel, they began to crack about the Bass and which of them twa was to
get the warding o't, and by little and little cam to very ill words, and
twined in anger. I mind weel, that as my faither and me gaed hame again,
he cam ower and ower the same expression, how little he likit Tod
Lapraik and his dwams.

"Dwam!" says he. "I think folk hae brunt far dwams like yon."

Aweel, my faither got the Bass and Tod had to go wantin'. It was
remembered sinsyne what way he had ta'en the thing. "Tam," says he, "ye
hae gotten the better o'me aince mair, and I hope," says he, "ye'll find
at least a' that ye expeckit at the Bass." Which have since been thought
remarkable expressions. At last the time came for Tam Dale to take young
solans. This was a business he was weel used wi', he had been a
craigsman frae a laddie, and trustit nane but himsel'. So there was he
hingin' by a line an' speldering on the craig face, whaur it's hieest
and steighest. Fower tenty lads were on the tap, hauldin' the line and
mindin' for his signals. But whaur Tam hung there was naething but the
craig, and the sea belaw, and the solans skirling and flying. It was a
braw spring morn, and Tam whustled as he claught in the young geese.
Mony's the time I heard him tell of this experience, and aye the swat
ran upon the man.

It chanced, ye see, that Tam keeked up, and he was awaur of a muckle
solan, and the solan pyking at the line. He thocht this by-ordinar and
outside the creature's habits. He minded that ropes was unco saft
things, and the solan's neb and the Bass Rock unco hard, and that twa
hunner feet were raither mair than he would care to fa'.

"Shoo!" says Tam. "Awa', bird! Shoo, awa' wi' ye!" says he.

The solan keekit doun into Tam's face, and there was something unco in
the creature's ee. Just the ae keek it gied, and back to the rope. But
now it wroucht and warstl't like a thing dementit. There never was the
solan made that wroucht as that solan wroucht; and it seemed to
understand it's employ brawly, birzing the saft rope between the neb of
it and a crunkled jag o' stane.

There gaed a cauld stend o' fear into Tam's heart. "This thing is nae
bird," thinks he. His een turnt backward in his heid and the day gaed
black about him. "If I get a dwam here," he thoucht, "it's by wi' Tam
Dale." And he signalled for the lads to pu' him up.

And it seemed the solan understood about signals. For nae sooner was the
signal made than he let be the rope, spried his wings, squawked out
loud, took a turn flying, and dashed straucht at Tam Dale's een. Tam had
a knife, he gart the cauld steel glitter. And it seemed the solan
understood about knives, for nae suner did the steel glint in the sun
than he gied the ae squawk, but laigher, like a body disappointit, and
flegged aff about the roundness of the craig, and Tam saw him nae mair.
And as sune as that thing was gane, Tam's held drapt upon his shouther,
and they pu'd him up like a deid corp, dadding on the craig.

A dram of brandy (which he went never without) broucht him to his mind,
or what was left of it. Up he sat.

"Rin, Geordie, rin to the boat, mak' sure of the boat, man--rin!" he
cries, "or yon solan 'll have it awa'," says he.

The fower lads stared at ither, an' tried to whilly-wha him to be quiet.
But naething, would satisfy Tam Dale, till ane o' them had startit on
aheid to stand sentry on the boat. The ithers askit if he was for down
again.

"Na," says he, "and niether you nor me," says he, "and as sune as I can
win to stand on my twa feet we'll be aff frae this craig o' Sawtan."

Sure eneuch, nae time was lost, and that was ower muckle; for before
they won to North Berwick Tam was in a crying fever. He lay a' the
simmer; and wha was sae kind as come speiring for him, but Tod Lapraik!
Folk thocht afterwards that ilka time Tod cam near the house the fever
had worsened. I kenna for that; but what I ken the best, that was the
end of it.

It was about this time o' the year; my grandfaither was out at the white
fishing; and like a bairn, I but to gang wi' him. We had a grand take, I
mind, and the way that the fish lay broucht us near in by the Bass,
whaur we forgaithered wi' anither boat that belanged to a man Sandie
Fletcher in Castleton. He's no lang deid niether, or ye could spier at
himsel'. Weel, Sandie hailed.

"What's yon on the Bass?" says he.

"On the Bass?" says grandfaither.

"Ay," says Sandie, "on the green side o't."

"Whatten kind of a thing?" says grandfaither. "There cannae be naething
on the Bass but just the sheep."

"It looks unco like a body," quo' Sandie, who was nearer in.

"A body!" says we, and we nane of us likit that. For there was nae boat
that could have broucht a man, and the key o' the prison yett hung ower
my faither's held at hame in the press bed.

We keept the twa boats closs for company, and crap in nearer hand.
Grandfaither had a gless, for he had been a sailor, and the captain of a
smack, and had lost her on the sands of Tay. And when we took the gless
to it, sure eneuch there was a man. He was in a crunkle o' green brae, a
wee below the chaipel, a' by his lee lane, and lowped and flang and
danced like a daft quean at a waddin'.

"It's Tod," says grandfaither, and passed the gless to Sandie.

"Ay, it's him," says Sandie.

"Or ane in the likeness o' him,'' says grandfaither.

"Sma' is the differ," quo' Sandie. "De'il or warlock, I'll try the gun
at him," quo' he, and broucht up a fowling-piece that he aye carried,
for Sandie was a notable famous shot in all that country.

"Haud your hand, Sandie," says grandfaither; "we maun see clearer
first," says he, "or this may be a dear day's wark to the baith of us."

"Hout!" says Sandie, "this is the Lord's judgments surely, and be damned
to it!" says he.

"Maybe ay, and maybe no," says my grandfaither, worthy man! "But have
you a mind of the Procurator Fiscal, that I think ye'll have
forgaithered wi' before," says he.

This was ower true, and Sandie was a wee thing set ajee. "Aweel, Edie,"
says he, "and what would be your way of it?"

"Ou, just this," says grandfaither. "Let me that has the fastest boat
gang back to North Berwick, and let you bide here and keep an eye on
Thon. If I cannae find Lapraik, I'll join ye and the twa of us'll have a
crack wi' him. But if Lapraik's at hame, I'll rin up the flag at the
harbour, and ye can try Thon Thing wi' the gun."

Aweel, so it was agreed between them twa. I was just a bairn, an' clum
in Sandie's boat, whaur I thoucht I would see the best of the employ. My
grandsire gied Sandie a siller tester to pit in his gun wi' the leid
draps, bein' mair deidly again bogles. And then the ae boat set aff for
North Berwick, an' the tither lay whaur it was and watched the wanchancy
thing on the braeside.

A' the time we lay there it lowped and flang and capered and span like a
teetotum, and whiles we could hear it skelloch as it span. I hae seen
lassies, the daft queans, that would lowp and dance a winter's nicht,
and still be lowping and dancing when the winter's day cam in. But there
would be folk there to hauld them company, and the lads to egg them on;
and this thing was its lee-lane. And there would be a fiddler diddling
his elbock in the chimney-side; and this thing had nae music but the
skirling of the solans. And the lassies were bits o' young things wi'
the reid life dinnling and stending in their members; and this was a
muckle, fat, crieshy man, and him fa'n in the vale o' years. Say what ye
like, I maun say what I believe. It was joy was in the creature's heart;
the joy o' hell, I daursay: joy whatever. Mony a time I have askit
mysel', why witches and warlocks should sell their sauls (whilk are
their maist dear possessions) and be auld, duddy, wrunkl't wives or
auld, feckless, doddered men; and then I mind upon Tod Lapraik dancing
a' they hours by his lane in the black glory of his heart. Nae doubt
they burn for it in muckle hell, but they have a grand time here of it,
whatever!--and the Lord forgie us!

Weel, at the hinder end, we saw the wee flag yirk up to the mast-held
upon the harbour rocks. That was a' Sandie waited for. He up wi' the
gun, took a deleeberate aim, an' pu'd the trigger. There cam' a bang and
then ae waefu' skirl frae the Bass. And there were we rubbin' our een
and lookin' at ither like daft folk. For wi' the bang and the skirl the
thing had clean disappeared. The sun glintit, the wund blew, and there
was the bare yaird whaur the Wonder had been lowping and flinging but ae
second syne.

The hale way hame I roared and grat wi' the terror of that dispensation.
The grawn folk were nane sae muckle better; there was little said in
Sandie's boat but just the name of God; and when we won in by the pier,
the harbour rocks were fair black wi' the folk waitin' us. It seems they
had fund Lapraik in ane of his dwams, cawing the shuttle and smiling. Ae
lad they sent to hoist the flag, and the rest abode there in the
wabster's house. You may be sure they liked it little; but it was a
means of grace to severals that stood there praying in to themsel's (for
nane cared to pray out loud) and looking on thon awesome thing as it
cawed the shuttle. Syne, upon a suddenty, and wi' the ae driedfu'
skelloch, Tod sprang up frae his hinderlands and fell forrit on the wab,
a bluidy corp.

When the corp was examined the leid draps hadnae played buff upon the
warlock's body; sorrow a leid drap was to be fund; but there was
grandfather's siller tester in the puddock's heart of him.

       *       *       *       *       *

Andie had scarce done when there befell a mighty silly affair that had
its consequence. Neil, as I have said, was himself a great narrator. I
have heard since that he knew all the stories in the Highlands; and
thought much of himself, and was thought much of by others, on the
strength of it. Now Andie's tale reminded him of one he had already
heard.

"She would ken that story afore," he said. "She was the story of Uistean
More M'Gillie Phadrig and the Gavar Vore."

"It is no sic a thing," cried Andie. "It is the story of my faither (now
wi' God) and Tod Lapraik. And the same in your beard," says he; "and
keep the tongue of ye inside your Hielant chafts!"

In dealing with Highlanders it will be found, and has been shown in
history, how well it goes with Lowland gentlefolk; but the thing appears
scarce feasible for Lowland commons. I had already remarked that Andie
was continually on the point of quarrelling with our three Macgregors,
and now, sure enough, it was to come.

"Thir will be no words to use to shentlemans," says Neil.

"Shentlemans!" cries Andie. "Shentlemans, ye hielant stot! If God would
give ye the grace to see yoursel' the way that ithers see ye, ye would
throw your denner up."

There came some kind of a Gaelic oath from Neil, and the black knife was
in his hand that moment.

There was no time to think; and I caught the Highlander by the leg, and
had him down, and his armed hand pinned out, before I knew what I was
doing. His comrades sprang to rescue him, Andie and I were without
weapons, the Gregara three to two. It seemed we were beyond salvation,
when Neil screamed in his own tongue, ordering the others back, and made
his submission to myself in a manner the most abject, even giving me up
his knife which (upon a repetition of his promises) I returned to him on
the morrow.

Two things I saw plain: the first, that I must not build too high on
Andie, who had shrunk against the wall and stood there, as pale as
death, till the affair was over; the second, the strength of my own
position with the Highlanders, who must have received extraordinary
charges to be tender of my safety. But if I thought Andie came not very
well out in courage, I had no fault to find with him upon the account of
gratitude. It was not so much that he troubled me with thanks, as that
his whole mind and manner appeared changed; and as he preserved ever
after a great timidity of our companions, he and I were yet more
constantly together.

       *       *       *       *       *




CHAPTER XVI

THE MISSING WITNESS


On the seventeenth, the day I was trysted with the Writer, I had much
rebellion against fate. The thought of him waiting in the _King's Arms_,
and of what he would think, and what he would say when next we met,
tormented and oppressed me. The truth was unbelievable, so much I had to
grant, and it seemed cruel hard I should be posted as a liar and a
coward, and have never consciously omitted what it was possible that I
should do. I repeated this form of words with a kind of bitter relish,
and re-examined in that light the steps of my behaviour. It seemed I had
behaved to James Stewart as a brother might; all the past was a picture
that I could be proud of, and there was only the present to consider. I
could not swim the sea, nor yet fly in the air, but there was always
Andie. I had done him a service, he liked me; I had a lever there to
work on; if it were just for decency, I must try once more with Andie.

It was late afternoon; there was no sound in all the Bass but the lap
and bubble of a very quiet sea; and my four companions were all crept
apart, the three Macgregors higher on the rock, and Andie with his Bible
to a sunny place among the ruins; there I found him in deep sleep, and,
as soon as he was awake, appealed to him with some fervour of manner and
a good show of argument.

"If I thoucht it was to do guid to ye, Shaws!" said he, staring at me
over his spectacles.

"It's to save another," said I, "and to redeem my word. What would be
more good than that? Do ye no mind the scripture, Andie? And you with
the Book upon your lap! _What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole
world?"_

"Ay," said he, "that's grand for you. But where do I come in? I have my
word to redeem the same's yoursel'. And what are ye asking me to do, but
just to sell it ye for siller?"

"Andie! have I named the name of siller?" cried I.

"Ou, the name's naething," said he; "the thing is there, whatever. It
just comes to this; if I am to service ye the way that you propose, I'll
loss my lieihood. Then it's clear ye'll have to make it up to me, and a
pickle mair, for your ain credit like. And what's that but just a bribe?
And if even I was certain of the bribe! But by a' that I can learn, it's
far frae that; and if _you_ were to hang, where would _I_ be? Na: the
thing's no possible. And just awa' wi' ye like a bonny lad! and let
Andie read his chapter."

I remember I was at bottom a good deal gratified with this result; and
the next humour I fell into was one (I had near said) of gratitude to
Prestongrange, who had saved me, in this violent, illegal manner, out of
the midst of my dangers, temptations, and perplexities. But this was
both too flimsy and too cowardly to last me long, and the remembrance of
James began to succeed to the possession of my spirits. The 21st, the
day set for the trial, I passed in such misery of mind as I can scarce
recall to have endured, save perhaps upon Isle Earraid only. Much of the
time I lay on a braeside betwixt sleep and waking, my body motionless,
my mind full of violent thoughts. Sometimes I slept indeed; but the
court-house of Inverary and the prisoner glancing on all sides to find
his missing witness, followed me in slumber; and I would wake again with
a start to darkness of spirit and distress of body. I thought Andie
seemed to observe me, but I paid him little heed. Verily, my bread was
bitter to me, and my days a burthen.