Chapter II: Rob Roy at Last

During this harangue Frank's mysterious guide had been gradually edging toward the door, and showing signs of slipping away. But even when looking carefully over Mr. Owen's papers, the keen eyes of the magistrate detected the movement.

"Shut the door, Stanchells, and keep it locked!" he cried.

The Highlander took three or four steps across the room, muttered an execration in Gaelic, and then with an air of careless defiance set himself down on a table and proceeded to whistle a stave with all possible assurance.

The Bailie soon arranged Mr. Owen's affairs. He would become his bail himself, and promised to secure his liberation early next morning. Then he took the lantern from his servant Mattie, and, holding it up, proceeded to examine the stern, set countenance of Frank's guide. That stout-hearted Celt did not move a muscle under the inspection, but with his arms folded carelessly, his heel beating time to the lilt of his whistled strathspey, he came very near to deceiving the acuteness of his investigator.

"Eh--ah--no--it cannot be. It is! Eh, ye born deevil, ye robber--ye catheran! Can this be you?"

"E'en as ye see me, Bailie!" was the short response.

"Ye cheat-the-gallows, ye reiving villain--what think you is the value of your head now!" cried the Bailie.

"Umph! Fairly weighed and Dutch measure," came the answer, "it might weigh down one provost's, four bailies', a town-clerk's, six deacons', besides stent-masters'--!"

"Tell over your sins," interrupted Mr. Nicol Jarvie, "and prepare ye, for if I speak the word--"

"But ye will _not_ speak the word," said the Highlander, coolly.

"And why should I not?" said the Bailie, "answer me that--why should I not?"

"For three sufficient reasons, Bailie Jarvie," he retorted, "first, for auld langsyne. Second, for the sake of the auld wife ayont the fire at Stuckavrallachan, that made some mixture of our bloods--to my shame be it spoken that _I_ should have a cousin a weaver. And lastly, Bailie, because if I saw a sign of your betraying me, I would plaster the wall there with your brains, long before any hand of man could rescue you!"

"Ye are a bold, desperate villain, sir," retorted the undaunted Bailie, "and ye ken that I ken ye to be so--but that were it only my own risk, I would not hesitate a moment."

"I ken well," said the other, "ye have gentle blood in your veins, and I would be loath to hurt my own kinsman. But I go out of here free as I came in, or the very walls of Glasgow tolbooth shall tell the tale these ten years to come!"

"Well, well," said Mr. Jarvie, "after all, blood is thicker than water. Kinsfolk should not see faults to which strangers are blind. And, as you say, it would be sore news to the auld wife below the Ben, that you, ye Hieland limmer, had knockit out my brains, or that I had got you strung up in a halter. But, among other things, where is the good thousand pound Scots that I lent you, and when am I to be seeing it?"

"Where is it?" said the unknown, grimly, "why, where last year's snow is, I trow!"

"And that's on the tap o' Schehallion, ye Hieland dog," said Mr. Jarvie, "and I look for payment from ye where ye stand."

"Ay," said the Highlander, unmoved, "but I carry neither snow nor silver in my sporran. Ye will get it, Bailie--just when the King enjoys his ain again, as the auld sang says!"

Then the magistrate turned to Frank.

"And who may this be?" he demanded, "some reiver ye hae listed, Rob? He looks as if he had a bold heart for the highway, and a neck that was made express for the hangman's rope!"

"This," said Owen, horrified at the Bailie's easy prediction as to the fate of his young master, "this is Mr. Francis Osbaldistone, only son of the head of our house--"

"Ay, I have heard of him," said the Bailie, still more contemptuously, "he that ran away and turned play-actor, through pure dislike to the work an honest man should live by!"

"Indeed," said the Highlander, "I had some respect for the callant even before I kenned what was in him. But now I honour him for his contempt of weavers and spinners, and sic-like mechanical persons."

"Ye are mad, Rob," said the Bailie, "mad as a March hare--though wherefore a hare should be madder in the month of March than at Martinmas is more than I can well say. But this young birkie here, that ye are hounding the fastest way to the gallows--tell me, will all his stage-plays and his poetries, or your broad oaths and drawn dirks tell him where Rashleigh Osbaldistone is? Or Macbeth and all his kernes and galloglasses, and your own to boot, procure him the five thousand pounds to answer the bills that must fall due ten days hence--were they all sold by auction at Glasgow Cross--basket hilts, Andrea Ferraras, leathern targets, brogues, brechan, and sporrans?"

"Ten days!" said Frank, instinctively drawing Diana Vernon's letter out of his pocket. The time had elapsed, and he was now free to open it.

A thin sealed enclosure fell out, and the wandering airs of the prison wafted it to Bailie Jarvie's feet. He lifted it and at once handed it to the Highlander, who, after glancing at the address, proceeded calmly to open it.

Frank tried vainly to interpose.

"You must first satisfy me that the letter is intended for you, before I can allow you to read it," he said.

"Make yourself easy, Mr. Osbaldistone," answered the Highlander, looking directly at him for the first time, "remember Justice Inglewood, Clerk Jobson, Mr. Morris--above all, remember your very humble servant, Robert Campbell, and the beautiful Diana Vernon."

The vague resemblance which had been haunting Frank ever since he had heard this man's voice was now at once made plain. The cloak being dropped and the man's face turned full upon him, he saw that it was indeed the same Highland drover who had borne unexpected testimony in his favour when he was in danger of his life in the house of Mr. Justice Inglewood.

"It is a difficult cast she has given me to play," said the Highlander, looking at Die Vernon's letter, "but I daresay I shall be able to serve you. Only you must come and visit me in my own country. I cannot hope to aid you on the paving stones of Glasgow. And you, Bailie, if you will come up with this young gentleman as far as the Clachan of Aberfoil, I will pay you the thousand pounds Scots that I owe you."

"Such a journey ill becomes my place," said the Bailie, doubtfully, "but if I did come, would you really and soothfully pay me the siller?"

"I swear to you," said the Highlander, "by him that sleeps beneath the grey stane at Inch Cailleach!

"But," he continued, "I must be budging. For the air of the Glasgow tolbooth is no that over salutary to a Highland constitution."

"Ohon," said the Bailie, "that I should be art and part in an escape from justice--it will be a disgrace to me all the days of my life! Aweel, we have all our backslidings to answer for. Stanchells, open the door!"

The head jailor stared at the two visitors who had gotten into Mr. Owen's cell without his leave, but he was reassured by the Bailie's careless "Friends of mine, Stanchells, friends of mine!"

The party descended to the lower vestibule, and there called more than once for Dougal, but without effect.

Whereupon Campbell observed, with a quiet smile, that "if Dougal was the lad he kenned him, he would scarce wait to be thanked for his share of that night's work, but would now be full trot for the pass of Ballamaha--"

"And am I myself," cried the angry Bailie, "to be locked up in the tolbooth all night? Send for fore-hammers, sledge-hammers, pincers! Send for Deacon Yettlin, the smith. And as for that Hieland blackguard, he shall hang as high as Haman--"

"When ye catch him," said Campbell, gravely, "but wait, surely the jail door is not locked!"

And so it turned out.

"He has some glimmerings of sense, that Dougal creature," added the Highlander; "he kenned that an open door might have served me at a pinch!"

So saying he sprang into the darkness, and soon the street resounded to low signal whistles, uttered and instantly replied to.

"Hear to the Hieland deevils," said Mr. Jarvie; "they think themselves already on the skirts of Ben Lomond! But what's this?"

There was a clash of iron at his feet, and stooping to the causeway cobbles, the Bailie lifted the keys of the jail which Dougal had carried away in his flight.

"Indeed," he said, "and that's just as well. For they cost the burgh siller, and there might have been some talk in the council about the loss of them, that I would little like to have heard. It would not be the first time they had cast up my kin to me, if Bailie Grahame and some others should get wind of this night's work."

The next morning at the Bailie's hospitable table, Frank Osbaldistone met Mr. Owen--but altogether another Owen from him of the tolbooth--neat, formal, and well brushed as ever, though still in the lowest of spirits about the misfortunes of the house.

They had not long begun when Frank, who could be brusque enough upon occasion, startled the Bailie by the question, "And pray, by the bye, Mr. Nicol Jarvie, who is this Mr. Robert Campbell whom I met last night?"

The question, abruptly put, seemed to knock the worthy Bailie all of a heap. He stammered and repeated it over and over, as if he had no answer ready.

"Wha's Mr. Robert Campbell? Ahem--ahay--! Wha's Mr. Robert Campbell, quo' he?"

"Yes," repeated the young Englishman, "I mean who and what is he?"

"Why, he's--ahay! He's--ahem! Where did _you_ meet Mr. Robert Campbell, as you call him yourself?"

"I met him by chance," Frank answered promptly, "some months ago, in the north of England."

"Then, Mr. Osbaldistone," said the Bailie, doggedly, "ye ken just as much about him as I do!"

"I should suppose not, Mr. Jarvie," said Frank, "since you are, it seems, both his relation and his friend!"

"There is doubtless some cousinship between us," said the Bailie, with reluctance, "but I have seen little of Rob since he left the cattle-dealing. He was hardly used by those who might have treated him better, poor fellow."

More than this for the moment Frank could not extract from Mr. Jarvie, and indeed his father's affairs were naturally the first consideration. As Frank could not help with their business matters and arrangements, the Bailie dismissed him without ceremony, telling him that he might go up to the College Yards, where he would find some that could speak Greek and Latin, but that he must be back at one o'clock "_preceesely_" to partake of the Bailie's family leg of mutton and additional tup's head.

It was while Frank Osbaldistone was pacing to and fro in the College Yards, that, from behind a hedge, he saw three men talking together. At first he could hardly believe his eyes. For one of them, the very sight of whom caused a disagreeable thrill to pass through his body, was none other than Rashleigh himself, while the other two were Morris and Mr. MacVittie,--the very three men who could do him the most harm in the world.

At the end of the avenue MacVittie and Morris left the gardens, while Rashleigh returned alone, apparently pacing the walk in deep meditation. Frank suddenly appeared before him, and challenged him to give up the deeds and titles he had stolen from his father.

Rashleigh, whom no surprise could stir out of his cool native audacity, answered that it would be better for his cousin to go and amuse himself in his world of poetical imagination, and to leave the business of life to men who understood and could conduct it.

Words grew hotter and hotter between the two young men, till Rashleigh, stung by a reference to Diana Vernon, bade Frank follow him to a secluded place where he would be able to chastise him for his boyish insolence.

Accordingly Frank followed him, keeping a keen watch on his adversary lest he should attempt any treachery. And it was well that he did so. For Rashleigh's sword was at his breast before he had time to draw, or even to lay down his cloak, and he only saved his life by springing a pace or two backward in all haste.

In the matter of fence, Frank found Rashleigh quite his match--his own superior skill being counterbalanced by Rashleigh's longer and more manageable sword and by his great personal strength and ferocity. He fought, indeed, more like a fiend than a man. Every thrust was meant to kill, and the combat had all the appearance of being to the death.

At last Frank stumbled accidentally, and Rashleigh's sword passed through his coat and out at the back, just grazing his side, whereupon Frank, seizing the hilt of his antagonist's sword, shortened his grip and was on the point of running him through the body. But the death-grapple was put an end to in the nick of time, by the intervention of Campbell, who suddenly appeared out of the bushes and threw himself between them. Rashleigh demanded fiercely of the Highlander how he dared to interfere where his honour was concerned.

But Campbell, with a whistle of his broadsword about his head, reminded him that so far as "daring" went, he was ready to make mincemeat of the pair of them. But though this cooled Rashleigh's temper at once, it was far from appeasing Frank, who swore that he would keep hold of his cousin till he had given up all he had stolen from his father.

"You hear!" said Rashleigh to Campbell; "he rushes upon his fate. On his own head be it!"

But the Highlander would not permit the young man to be ill treated, only for standing up for his own father. He took hold of Frank, however, and by a gigantic effort he caused him to release Rashleigh's coat which he had seized in his anger.

"Let go his collar, Mr. Francis," he commanded. "What he says is true. Ye are more in danger of the magistrate in this place than what he is. Take the bent, Mr. Rashleigh. Make one pair of legs worth two pair of hands. You have done that before now."

Rashleigh, with a last threat of future revenge, took up his sword, wiped it, put it back in its sheath, and disappeared in the bushes.

In spite of his struggles the Highlander held Frank till it was vain for him to pursue Rashleigh, and then Campbell had some advice to give him.

"Let him alone," he said. "I tell you, man, he has the old trap set for you. And here I cannot give you the same help that I did in the house of Justice Inglewood. Now go your ways home, like a good bairn. Keep out of the sight of Rashleigh, and Morris, and that MacVittie animal. Mind the Clachan of Aberfoil, and by the word of a gentleman I will not see you wronged."

On his way back Frank had his slight wound dressed by a surgeon and apothecary in the neighbourhood, who refused to believe his explanation about the button of his adversary's foil slipping.

"There never was button on the foil that made this!" he said. "Ah, young blood--young blood! But fear not--we surgeons are a secret generation!"

And so dismissed, Frank soon found his way back to Mr. Jarvie's family leg of mutton and tup's head, only a few minutes after the appointed stroke of one.

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