Chapter V: Part 5

It happened that there was a worthy knight, an indweller in the town of Maybole, Sir Thomas Nisbett by name, who was a crony of my master Culzean. Now, it was the practice for the gentry of the neighbourhood during the winter, to enter in and dwell within the town of Maybole in many pretty and well-built houses of freestone, diverting themselves during the dead time of the year with converse together in each other's houses. These stand for the most part in the chief street of Maybole, and have fine gardens attached to them. Of them all, that of the Earl of Cassillis, is the largest, but the one belonging to my master Culzean is but little behind it in beauty and convenience.

But Sir Thomas Kennedy bode little about his house in Maybole, chiefly because his lads and lasses loved most to remain at Culzean, where the cliffs are and the sea spreads wide, clattering pleasantly on the rocks, and with the birds blithely swirling and diving about it all the year round. And of this I also was glad, for to live in a town is a thing I cannot abide for any long time, being bred to the life of the hills and to the wind in my face.

Now, on this New Year's Day, it so happened that this Sir Thomas Nisbett had invited my master, being, as I say, a crony of his own, and of an age with him, to sit down at supper in his house in Maybole. So Culzean took horse and a small attendance, of whom I was the chief, and rode over to bide the night in Maybole town, meaning to lodge in his own house, and in the morning return to his Castle of Culzean.

My master was a mightily curious man in one particular. He could not abide any repair of people coming and going with him on his journeyings. And if in a quieter time he had gotten his will, he would have ridden here and there without any attendance whatever--so kindly and unsuspicious of evil was his nature. On the New Year night he had bidden me to remain within doors, because, as he said, he knew his way home full well from Sir Thomas Nisbett's house. Also, I suspect, he wished me not to observe whether he retained his usual walk and conversation, after seeing the New Year in with the Provost and the other Sir Thomas, for the custom of Maybole was exceedingly hospitable.

New Year's Day had been dark and gloomy. The promise of oncoming foul weather was in the feel of the raw, drooky air. No sooner was it dark than a smurr of rain began to fell, very wetting and thick, so that even with torches it had been impossible to see many paces. We reached our lodging at the town house of Culzean before the night had set in, and as the supper was at six of the clock, it was no long time before my master took his way to Sir Thomas Nisbett's house. He left me seated by the fire with a book of chronicles of the wars to read. As soon, however, as he had issued forth upon the street, I took my bare sword in my hand, and by another door I sallied forth also. For in such a town as Maybole there are always ill-set folk that would gladly do an injury to a well-kenned and well-respected man like my master. And much more now when the feud had waxed so hot and high.

But it chanced that Sir Thomas, so soon almost as he set foot over the doorstep, greeted his fellow-guest, the Provost of the town--who, as became his office, had with him one to hold the tail of his furred gown out of the clarty mud, and also a lad with a torch running before him. Nevertheless, I followed on in that darker dusk which succeeds the glare of a torch. On our way we had to pass through the garden behind the house of Sir Thomas Nisbett, which was full of groset bushes, divided by high hedges of yew and box. I came softly after them, and abode still by the gate when the Provost and his train had passed through with our good knight in their midst. The pair of them were talking jovially together as they went, like men with toom kytes that know they are going in to be filled with good cheer.

'I declare I am as hungry as a moudiewort in a black frost,' said the douce Provost. 'I haena seen meat the day. What wi' hearkening to auld wives denouncing ane anither for kenned and notour witches, and sending men of the tribes of little Egypt to the Tolbooth, my life has no been my ain.'

My master laughed loudly and heartsomely.

'It is weel to be hungry and ken o' meat,' he replied, in the words of the well-kenned proverb.

And the pair of them laughed with their noses in the air, easily mirthful like men that strengthen themselves with the comfortable smell of dinner blown through an open door.

But I question much whether they had laughed so heartily if they had seen what I saw at that moment. And that was a face looking over the height of the yew hedge--a face wrapped about the mouth with a grey plaid and with a grey brimmed hat pulled close down over the eyes. As the flickering of the torch died out at the entering in of the house door, I saw the man raise his hand in a warning and forbidding gesture, as though he made a signal to men who could see him, but who were hidden from my sight.

This was enough for me. I resolved that those who plotted evil behind backs should have to war with Launce Kennedy, who, at least, was no mean foe, and one not given to wearing his eyes under his coat.

Not for a moment after this could I leave the garden, for one of the villains might have gone to the window and shot at my master through the glass--as one had done years before to good Maister John Knox (who, as I have heard tell, reformed religion in this land) on an evening he sat quietly reading his book and drinking of his ale in his own house in the High Street of Edinburgh.

So I got me into an angle of the garden and climbed a wall, which, being grown with ivy, was a good and safe post of vantage. From thence I could overlook the whole enclosure. After a little my eyes became better accustomed to the darkness. The lights from the windows also made a faint glimmering athwart the hedges, and I could distinctly see men darning themselves into their hiding-places, and getting ready their pistols and hackbutts.

Even as I sat there on the wall and froze, a plan came into my head which sent the blood surging through my veins, like the tide scouring the gut of Solway. I remembered that Sir Thomas Kennedy was at no time very active on his legs, and what with the income in his knee and the good wine under his belt, he would assuredly be in no key for running when he issued forth.

Also they were certainly many who lay in wait for him. I counted at least five moving about in the faint light. So I mounted the top of the ivied wall, and slid down the outside, landing heavily on my hinderlands in a ditch. I stole round to the gable door of Nisbett's house, and told the manservant that I had come to see my master, whereupon they permitted me to go up to the room on the first storey, where the guests were already set down at the banquet. I knew well that it was no use speaking to my lord, but I did venture to call out the host, Sir Thomas Nisbett, whose head was stronger and whose heart more readily suspicious than those of the Laird of Culzean.

Him I told how the matter stood, whereupon he wished to speak to the Provost and to call the town officers. But I assured him that these determined assassins in the yard could render an account of the town guard twice told over.

'So,' said I, 'I have this to propose to you in a word. When the time comes for the guests to depart, you will detain my master--and the Provost, too, if you can.'

'Ere I have done with them they will not move far to-night, or my name is not Thomas Nisbett,' said the host, nodding his head, for these were the manners and hospitalities of the time.

'And you will lock them in a secure place till the morning!'

'But,' said Nisbett, 'will not the villains attack my house? If it be as you say, they have assurance for everything.'

I told him that they might very well do that, but that if he gave me a mailed coat with plate sleeves, and also kneecaps of steel, together with my arms and cap, I thought I could make a race for it and carry them all off along with me.

'But, laddie,' he cried, 'ye gang to your death!'

I told him not so, for that even when accoutred I was a notable runner, and could course like a hare.

'And in any case, better Launce Kennedy be dead than Culzean, or the Provost and yourself, Sir Thomas Nisbett. What would happen to the town and countryside then?'

'Ay, better that,' he said very sententiously, at which I could scarce forbear but smile, for the very simplicity of the man was such that he not only counted his life worth more than mine, but expected me to do the same. However, it was not concerning him, but of my master and my master's children that I thought. What mattered little to a Kennedy of Kirrieoch, mattered greatly to Sir Thomas Kennedy, Tutor of Culzean. Yet I know not that I had any great fear of failure, for I had thus far won off scot-free, even when in the general engagement our faction had gotten the worst of it. And so I thought to do always.

The evening wore on like eternity, and I had many a thought in my heart, though but few of them were sad or waesooie, for I was too young. Most of all I prayed that I might bear myself well, and in some shape at least carry the matter through without dishonour.

When the Provost and my master had well drunken and eaten yet more, their host stole away from them on a pretext, and came to the chamber where I sat in darkness, planning how to make my way through the garden.

He brought me presently the equipment of which I had need, and of his own accord added another pistol of admirable French workmanship. For France is ever the country for good ordnance of all sorts--from the pistolet which Sir Thomas Nisbett gave me to the cannons that dang down the Castle of Saint Andrews about the heads of Normand Leslie and his crew.

'Gin ye live ye kin keep the pistol,' he said, as one that did me a vast kindness.

Then over my steel cap I set the great broad hat of Sir Thomas of Culzean, and did his cloak about me.

It was now the time to go, and I tell you true, my heart beat a pretty tune to dance to as I stood at the back of the door--with my host hiding well in the rear, lest they should nick him by firing as the light within showed me plain in the doorway.

So I ordered the lamp to be removed and the door to be opened. Then my host bade me adieu in a loud, hearty tone, and said that he would come round and visit me in the morning. It was with a bitter sort of joy, not wholly unpleasant, that I heard the door clash sharply to behind me. I had my sword in my right hand and my pistol ready bent in the other. And I bethought me how many would have risked the same wager of battle.

There was a light flickering somewhere in the town--belike a party passing homeward with torches from a merry making, or some of the bonfires lighted for the inbringing of the New Year. I could see my friend of the beckoning hand now standing erect with his plaid about him. He was the same I had seen at the burning of the Bible when I was but a boy in the courtyard of Ardstinchar, and, I doubted not, the Grey Man of our later troubles.

I knew that the sharpshooters would be placed in the alleys of the garden. Indeed, I had seen them pass to their situations, and observed that they had their hackbutts carefully pointed at the path along which I must pass. So instead of walking directly down the main road to the gate, I made believe to stumble on the threshold, and to recover myself with an exclamation of pain, in order that I might divert them into waiting till I should come their way. For I must perforce pass by the mouths of their muskets so close that they could not miss.

But instead of taking the main avenue, I darted sideways along the narrower path which led round the garden's edge, and there, cowering in the angle, I waited for what should happen. In their hurry and surprise I heard one hackbutt go off with a crash, and the light from the touch lit up the garden. Then in the darkness that followed I ran further down the walk towards the outer gate. In the midst I came upon a fellow who kneeled with his musket upon a stick, trained upon the middle path by which they had hoped that Culzean would come. Then with my sword I stuck the hulking villain through that part of him with which I came most readily in contact. What that might be, I declare that I know not until this day. Only I judged that it could not have been a very mortal one, by the vigour with which he cried out.

Then indeed there was confusion and deray to speak about. I saw the form of the Grey Man, whom I had observed directing the ambush, rise from the further dyke-side. He spoke sharply like one that cries orders, and at the word many men came rushing pell-mell to see what was the cause of the hideous outcry on that side of the garden where I was.

But I overstepped the carcase of the rascal into whom I had set my good blade, and most circumspectly made my way down the side of the wall unseen of any.

But when I had advanced as far as the way out by the single gate, my fate came, as it were, to the stern and deadly breach. For there were marksmen who had their pieces trained on that place. With my own eyes I had seen them set themselves in position. Nevertheless, the noise behind waxed so imminent that I drew a long breath, and sprang at the opening. As I went through, ten or twelve pieces at the least, both pistolets and hackbutts, were loosed off against me. I heard the bullets splash, splash all about my legs and body, and one that had bounded from the lintel of the door-post, dunted me on the breastplate, which it was a God's mercy I had minded to wear. Yet for all I escaped wholly unscathed.

Outside the gate there were two fellows that withstood me, and I had small time to ask whether they were friends or foes. So, to make siccar, I speered no catechisms of them, but only shot off my pistol into one of the thickest parts of one, setting the muzzle almost to his belt, and with yet more gladness gave the other a sound iron thrust in the shoulder. For all my life I have loved the point more than the edge--and a thousand times better than the powder and lead--which is an uncertain hit-or-miss thing at best.

I cleared the yett, sprang through, and there I had it down the High Street of Maybole with the bullets spelking about me like hailstones, and chance night-wandering burghers scudding for their doors like conies on the sandy knowes.

I heard the fierce rush of men behind me, and looking over my shoulder I saw some ten running my way with their swords drawn in their hands. So I knew that it was likely there would be one among them who could outrun me, having war-gear upon me and that not all mine own. With that I undid the cloak of the Laird of Culzean, my master, and let it fall; and so much lightened I sped on till, near to the house of one Matthew M'Gowan, they fairly ran me to earth.

*CHAPTER XV*

*A MIDNIGHT LEAGUER*

The place of my refuge was a summer-house set in a garden, and mostly made of wood. But it had three feet of stonework about the walls, which chance fortifications, as I think, saved my life. Then I praised the forethought with which I had brought with me abundant powder and shot in the horns I had slung at my girdle. I also remembered to thank Providence for misdirecting the bullets as I ran out of the garden door.

Here in this small child's playhouse it was my fortune to stand such a siege as mayhap never man stood before. And of that I shall tell, so that all may judge and see whether the reward which the Earl of Cassillis afterwards obtained for me, was at all out of keeping (as some allege) with the services which I, Launce Kennedy, sometime esquire, rendered to him and his house.

Yet I did the thing for love and by no means for reward. Ay, and largely without thought also. For such was the spirit of the times, that wagers of battle were accepted lightly to spite one and overpass another, like children that play Follow-my-leader upon the street.

So I lay in my summer-house, behind the low breastwork of stone, while above me the bullets rattled through the frail woodwork like hailstones that splash into still water.

Lying thus prone, I charged my pistols--a thing which, from long practice, I could do very well in the dark, and gazed out through the open windows that looked every way. What I suffered from most was the want of light upon the approaches of my castle at the top of the garden. For I was placed upon a little hill, and the ground sloped in every direction from me. Yet even this advantage of position did me little good, for the light was too uncertain to show me those that might come against me. And more than all, this uncertainty put me in a sweat lest I should shoot at shadows and allow the real enemy that came to invade and slay me to pass harmless, so that they would break upon me before I was aware.

Occasionally, however, the light that burned somewhere in the town cast glimmerings over the garden, and then I could see dark figures that crouched and scudded behind bushes and sheltered ayont the trunk of every leafless tree. After that God-sent illumination grew brighter, I think it is not too much to say that each time I got a fair chance at an enemy, there was one rascal the fewer alive--or at least one that had a shot the more in him. It cheered me to see them crawling out of the range of my ordnances as if they had been few and I a host.

Most of all I aimed, with the deadliest and most prayerful intent to kill, at the tall man in the cloak, whom I had seen from the first directing the ploy. Time and again I believed that I had him, but upon each occasion it was some meaner rogue that bore the brunt.

Thus I held my own with Sir Thomas's French pistol laid aside ready for them if they came with a rush, and my own for common use to load and fire again withal, till the barrels almost scorched me with the heat. Also I kept my sword ready to my hand, for when it comes to the edge of death, I put more confidence in my blade than in all the ordnance in the land. Though Heaven forbid that I should speak against the pistolet, when that very night I had so often owed my life to it. My chief hope now was that the Provost of the place, who had been a guest with Sir Thomas, might escape and rouse the townsfolk. The people of Maybole loved not the Barganies greatly, but, on the contrary, were devoted to the service of my master Culzean, because of his kindliness of disposition, and the heartsome way he had of calling them all 'Sandy' and 'Jeems,' according to their Christian name, a thing which goes a far road in Scotland.

It so happened just then that the fire that did me so much good--which, as I afterwards learned, was lighted by one of my enemies for frolic in the wood-yard of one Duncan Crerar, millwright--burned up a little and cast a skarrow over the garden where I was. When it was at its brightest, there came four fellows running up the brae all with their swords bare in their hands, so that it seemed that I was as good as dead, for it was manifestly impossible that I could withstand them all. But I minded the saying of a great captain of the old wars, 'Stop you the front rank, and the second will stop of itself.' So I took good and careful aim with my pistols at the two fellows that led the charge, and fired. The first of them tossed his blade in the air, spun about like a weathercock and fell headlong, while the other, lamed in his leg, as it appeared, tried to crawl back down the hill again. The two that came behind were no little daunted by this fall. Nevertheless, they still came on, but I cried out as loud as I could, 'Give me the other pistols, Sir Thomas, and I shall do for these two scoundrels also!'

At which they gave back in great astonishment and ran, I make no doubt, to tell their masters that they had to do with more than one old man well lined with sack and canary. Then in the breathing space I charged my pistols again, and cried to the fellow that was limping along the ground by the back of my summer-house,--

'Link it, my lad, back to your master, or I shall put another bullet in ye, in a place where it will stop you from groaning and hirpling there at my lug!'

For I understood well that he desired to take me in the rear.

At this moment there happened a thing surprising. I saw a tall, dark figure overleap a wall at the side from which the shots came thinnest. I saw it stoop and lay fire to something that was darker than itself, when instantly there arose from the pile of millwright's shavings and kindling wood a clear light which caused all the garden to be seen without any difficulty.

Then the tall, unknown figure, which seemed yet unaccountably familiar to me, walked slowly up the middle walk toward the summer-house, the pistols cracking all about, and the bullets splashing faster than ever upon the roof and sides of my shelter.

Then I saw who it was.

'Run for it, Robert Harburgh,' I cried. 'Man, you are mad.'

But I declare he never altered by a single pulse-beat his deliberate advance. At the door he paused as one that upon the threshold would turn to kick a yelping cur. Then giving the sharpshooters a wave of his hand in contempt, he entered and shut the door.

'Saint Kentigern's fish and a thousand devils,' said I, 'I am not feared of any man, but there is no sense in foolhardiness, Robert. Come in out of reach of their bullets this moment, thou fool!'

'Ah,' he returned to me, 'I had as lief die and be done with it.'

'But then I would not, for my stomach is in good order,' replied I, swiftly, 'so lie down on thy belly and at the least help me to keep alive, for I am most consumedly anxious to keep my body from proving leaky by the entering in of bullets.'

So, obediently he laid him down, watching one side of our cunning defences. He told me that he had heard what was a-doing--how that the Mures and Drummurchies, together with Sawny Bean, the savage carl that was called of the common people 'The Earl of Hell,' had gotten the Laird of Culzean in a little summer-house in a walled garden and were there worrying him to death.

'So,' said Harburgh, 'having nought better to do, I primed my pistols and came.'

The firing upon us grew hotter than ever. We seemed at times to be closed within a ring of fire. Yet neither of us were the least hurt, save that a chip from the edge of a stone, driven off by a bullet, had struck me on the cheek and made it bleed.

When the fire which Robert Harburgh had lighted burned up, we that were marksmen lost no chances at any who showed so much as an arm or a leg. And many of those murderous rascals whom we did not kill outright (not having a fair chance at them from their lying in shelter and other causes), were at least winged and sore damaged, so that we judged that there would be some roods of lint bandage required about Drummurchie and Auchendrayne on the morrow.

Outside we heard a great and growing turmoil and the sound of many voices crying 'To the death with the murderers! Break down the doors!'

It was the noise of the people who had risen in the night and were coming to help us. For in a moment the gate of the yard was broken down, and a rout of men in steel caps and hastily-donned armour came pouring in. And it had been comical to watch the array, if our urgent business had allowed. For some had put on a breastplate over their night gear; some fought like Highlandmen in their sark-tails, which, on the night of the New Year, must have been breezy wear; while others again had snatched a hackbutt and had forgotten the powder, so that now they carried the weapon like a club by the barrel.

Before these angry levies our cruel invaders vanished like smoke, as though they had never been, clambering over walls and scurrying through entries. But it is reported that several of them were sore hurt in thus escaping--indeed, here and there throughout the town were no fewer than five dead and six wounded, chiefly in the two gardens where I had been compelled to discharge my pistols.

Robert Harburgh stepped out of the summer-house before them all, stretching his limbs.

''Tis a cramped, ungodly place, friends,' he said. 'After all, it is better to fight in the open and risk it!'

'Where is the Laird of Culzean?' cried some that knew him not. 'If ye cannot show us the laird, ye shall die forthwith!'

'Nay,' replied Harburgh, 'concerning that I ken not. 'Tis not in my province, being general information. My parish is fighting, not the answering of questions. Come hither, Launce, and tell them of thy master!'

Whereat I came forth and told them of the cruel plot and the attack upon Sir Thomas at Nisbett's house. But they would not be satisfied till they had gone there and found him. Nothing would do but that he should show himself unhurt and speak a word to them at the window. Which, being of short-grained temper and with a monstrous headache, he was most loath to do. But Robert Harburgh, who had experience of suchlike, being before his marriage a great man of his cups, poured water upon his head, and, having dried it by rubbing, he brought him to the window, where he spoke to the people as his kindly friends and neighbours, and thanked them for their affection.

'Nay,' cried one, 'thank your own young squire, who has to-night ta'en your life upon him.'

So the people of Maybole, for the honest and honourable love which they bore us, abode under arms till the morning, and searched all the town for the murdering ruffians of Drummurchie. Yet they found them not, for such always have a back door to escape by.

In the morning, Sir Thomas called for his hat and cloak, and when they were brought he started in wonder and cried, 'What, in the name of the shrunk shanks of the Abbot of Crossraguel, is the meaning of this hole?'

Then Robert Harburgh said, ''Tis but an airy summer suit that Launcelot wore last night, when he went forth among those that sought to kill the Laird of Culzean.'

My master stared without comprehending. But when he fully understood, he clasped me in his arms.

'God knows,' he said, 'I would give my right hand, if I could believe that I had a son who would ever do as much for me. Those I have are good for naught but golf and stool-ball.'

Wherein by his hasty words he did his honest, silly lads much wrong.

*CHAPTER XVI*

*GREYBEARDS AND DIMPLE CHINS*

One Sabbath morn there came an unwonted message to me, as I sat lingering and idle in the armoury of Culzean. I had cleaned my own graith and oiled the pistols--which I regularly did on the Sabbath morning whenever I did not go to the kirk at Maybole. Now, this particular day of which I speak, I was idly conning the leaves of a song-book full of trifling, vain, and amatorious lilts and catches--some of them very pleasant, however, and taking to the mind. It ought to have been my psalm-book that I was at, God forgive me; but since ballad-book it was, why, even so will I set it down here.

And the message that came was by the mouth of a kind of jackal or lickpot of John Dick's--who, for reasons of his own, hated me, chiefly because I took no share in the foulness of him and his subservient crew. This youth was of so little worth, that in all the transactions of this book he has not once come into the narrative--though as I now remember he was at the tulzie in Edinburgh, and also at the flitting of the sow. On both occasions he was the first to run.

The name of him was Colin Millar, an ill-favoured, envious, upsetting knave, compact of various ignorances and incapacities. And there needs no more to be said about him.

'There is a man wanting to see you down at Sandy Allison's, the Grieve's,' he said.

Then he looked at me with the cast in his eye as crooked as a paddock's hind leg, and says he, 'The tat will be in the fire now, I'm thinking. They tell me that it is the Minister!'

I knew very well what the ill-tongued hound meant. So right gladly without a word I set the knuckles of my hand, Sabbath morning though it was, against his ugly face in a way that would leave a mark for a day or two.

'Take you that, dog,' I said to him, 'and learn to keep a more ruly member in your insolent head. Think not that you are John Dick, though you carry his dirty slanders. As the wild boar gnashes its tushes, so the little piglings squeak!'

And as he went away, lowering and snarling, I had a mind to go after him and give him something more than my knuckles. For the thing he meant was a lie of the devil, lighted at his furnace and spewed out of the reek of his pit.

But as I went to the door there came a poor lad from the stable with the same message--that there waited one for me at the house of Sandy Allison, the Grieve.

So I knew that the dog Millar had not invented the whole matter. Whereupon I looked carefully to my gear, did a new doublet upon me (because it was the Sabbath day) and girt me with a sash of blue, coft in Edinburgh and never before worn. Then setting my sword in its sheath, I went out through the woods, which were now grown leafless and songless.

There was a brisk air of winter, crisp without rawness, in the breeze, and I was glad to be out of doors; for since the matter of the meeting with Gilbert Kennedy, which by ill chance I had seen, both Marjorie and Nell came seldom my way. Which is, perhaps, why I looked so well to my apparelling ere I went to the Grieve's house. For a lad wearies for the speech of women-folk, and if he gets not one kind--why, he will seek another.

But now, when I come to think of it, I need not have troubled so to deck myself. For after the corner is turned and the long lane leads straight to the garden of roses, a woman cares not whether a man be clothed in dishclouts or whether he glitters like a bridegroom in cloth of gold.

So when I came near to the house there issued forth to meet me Kate Allison, which seemed to me like ancient days come back, and my heart beat in a fashion I never thought to feel again. For a burnt stick is easily lighted, and Kate Allison was, without doubt, both bonny and kind. She was waiting for me at the corner of the barn like one that has an assignation. So when she came near me she put her hands roguishly behind her, and said, 'Launce Kennedy, you are a false, deceitful lad, and no true lover. But think ye not that I care a pin, for I have gotten a braw lad of my own, and no thanks to you. Ye can get the Lady Marjorie to convoy hame next year from the Maybole Fair.'

And her speech made me glad, for she dropped me a courtesy and pretended to march off. So I knew full well that if she had not been heart-whole and at ease about all doubtful matters, she would have greeted me very differently. So, as I say, I was glad. Yet presently I liked it not so well as I expected, for though men are often false to their loves, they never understand how their loves can change from loving them. I knew well that Kate would, if not meddled with, immediately return to tell me what had befallen, and why it was that they had sent for me.

Which indeed was just what she did.

'We have gotten a mighty grave man here with us, who came to our house last night at e'en. We wanted to send word to the castle to Sir Thomas; but the man said that he had had enough of the Kennedies to last him his lifetime, and that he would put up with us, if we could make shift to give him a bed. He is a man of a majestic and noble countenance, and when he had come within, he took a Bible from his wallet, and tairged us tightly on the histories of the wars of the Jews and on points of doctrine.'

'Ye would be fit for that,' said I to her, laughing, 'for most of our discourse has been upon points of doctrine and practice--though I mind not that we touched upon the wars of the Jews. We had ever wars enough of our own. Was it not so, sweet Kate?'

And I would have taken her by the waist, for that is ever the way, as I have just been reading in my song-book, to punish a woman, when like a pretty scold, she slanders her love. So, as the London stage catch hath it, I forgave her for it. Yet for all she would by no means permit me to come near her--which I was mortally sorry for. Because though I wanted her to change, I desired her not to change so mightily as all that.

'Na, na,' she said, 'and that's by with. Kate Allison needs no general lovers. Wear you your own lady's favours; I can get them that loe me and none other, to wear mine.'

I pursued the subject no further at that time, meaning, however, to return to it. For a man likes not to see the things which have been freely his slipping from him like corn through a wide-meshed riddle. It makes his mind linger after things long past, and he begins to think them sweeter than any favours that ever he had, even when all the garden was most fully his to wander in and cull at his lordly pleasure.

Too soon for my liking, therefore, we came to the door of the Grieve's house, which was but a wide kitchen with two smaller rooms off it. I heard a voice uplifted as it seemed in prayer, and I bethought me with shame of my so late mean and earthly thoughts; but I looked at Kate Allison, and she was so pleasant to look upon that I found excuses for myself.

Then the prayer being done we went in, and they told the man in the inner room that that same Launcelot Kennedy, for whom he had inquired, was come.

So in a moment there came forth from the inner chamber, even as I had expected, Maister Robert Bruce. He wore his long, black cloak, and his fine, cloth coat showed soberly beneath it. His hat was on his head, which he doffed for a moment to Kate Allison and her mother, and then set on again. He bade them excuse him, for that he had much business to talk with me. I followed him out, and as I passed Kate, methought she looked disappointed that I should go thus soon. So, the corners of her mouth being down, and her mother's back turned, I put my hand beneath her chin, and plucked at the loose slip-knot of her bonnet, which was a pretty quipsome thing that haymakers use, but prettier on her than on any of them. Whereat she flashed forth a great, sharp pin and set it spitefully in my arm, which also was a pleasing habit of hers. But all was innocent and friendly enough, and my only excuse for thinking more of daffing with Kate Allison than of listening to the grave converse of Maister Robert Bruce, is that then I was nearing nineteen years of my age--which, as you all do know, is a time when maids' dimples are more moving than the wisdom of the sages.

That is all mine excuse, and, as well I wot, but a poor one. Yet when once Maister Bruce had me in the wood, taking me by the arm, the majesty of his countenance and the moving fervour of his voice so worked upon me that in good sooth I thought of naught but what he said.

He told me that he was resolved to depart out of this land of Carrick and Kyle, which might have been the Garden of Eden if it were not inhabited by devils. He had come no speed at reconciling the parties at feud, even as I could have told him before he began.

'When I had thought,' he said, 'that I had made some way in softening the heart of Gilbert Kennedy, who vaunts himself to be sincerely attached to me--and I do believe it--I said to him that he ought, for the settling of the quarrel, to give in his submission to his liege lord, the Earl of Cassillis. In a moment comes the fire into his eyes, the anger grows black in his heart, and all my good words are undone. I think you Kennedies are all of you possessed with evil spirits, even as it was in the days of the Gadarene out of whom Christ cast many devils.'

He paused a moment, and then continued,--

'So the name of the devils of Carrick is Legion, for they are very many!'

Then, being sorry that he should so speak of those who, after all, were my master's kin and in a manner my own--for all the world knows that a blood feud is a thing acknowledged in the Bible, as one may see when David lay on his deathbed--I asked him how I could serve him, in order that I might stay his abuse of that which he did not understand.

'You may wonder,' he went on, 'that I choose to speak in confidence to one that is but an esquire, and, I hear, as ready with his sword in the quarrel as any of them. But at least you are not like the rest, occupied entirely with the safety of your own skin, and unwilling to look the matter in the face.

I told him that I did not wonder at all that he was willing to speak to me, for that I could keep my counsel truly and well.

'Faith, and I believe that,' he cried, 'if it were only your self-conceit of being able to do it.'

But I understood not at all what he meant, for if there is anything that I am conspicuously lacking in, it is this very quality of self-conceit.

'Hear ye, then, and mark well my words,' said the Minister of Edinburgh. 'There is a man in this country who is at the root of all the blood and all the slaughter, and who, if he be not curbed, will yet do tenfold more mischief. Your master thinks that he can bribe him to friendship; well, I am no judge of men, if the man is to be bribed at any price beneath the sole power and sway of all this wild country of the west.'

'It is Gilbert Kennedy of Bargany that you mean,' said I, for I own I was jealous of his good name, enemy though he was.

'Gilbert Kennedy is but a hammer in this man's hand. Your good knight here at Culzean is but a spoon for him to sup with. And the only man that sees through him (and that but partially) is your joker-headed Earl, whose keen care for the merks, the duties, and the tacks, makes him somewhat clearer in the eye than the rest of you.'

'And who is this plotter?' said I.

He stopped and looked about him to see that none was listening. Then he laid his lips almost to my ear.

He whispered a name which, in this place, I must not write, though afterwards it will be plain enough.

'It is simply not possible,' said I; 'the man you mention is but a bonnet laird, as one might say, with a peel-tower and a holding of half-a-dozen crofts. Why, my master could eat him up saltless, without turning out more than half a parish of his fighting men.'

'Nevertheless,' said Robert Bruce, 'that is the man who stands behind and makes the miracles work, as in Popish days the priests were wont to do behind the altar. Ye are but a set of jigging fools here in Carrick, and the man that pipes to you is the man I've told ye of!'

Then I thought over the matter--all that I knew of the man.

'In truth,' said I, 'I am none so sure that you may not be right.'

Robert Bruce smiled as one that waxes aweary of a babe's prattle.

'For,' said I, 'I mind that I heard him endeavour to win one by promises to the side of Bargany--'

'Pshaw,' said the Minister, 'he would as readily try to win Bargany to the Earl's side, if it suited him to murder them both together. It is his plan to make them fight each other till there are none left--to cut off the heads of the taller poppies as in the ancient tale of Rome. I tell you this man has no side but his own, no desire but his own profit, no end but to make himself supreme in Carrick.'

'And what can I, that am but a squire and a youth, do in the matter?' said I.

'You are on the spot, Launcelot,' said the Minister, kindly. 'I am in Edinburgh, and if things march as evilly as they have been doing of late, it is likely I shall be even further afield than Edinburgh. But you can watch--you can judge whom it boots to warn. You can put in a word--'

'I shall put in a sword,' said I, stamping my foot; 'put it in deep--to think of such deceit and guile in a mere vassal and understrapper of my lord's.'

'Launcelot,' said the Minister of Edinburgh, 'you begin to make me sorry I trusted you. I should have spoken to a graver man.'

'Nay, sir,' I said, 'you mistake me. I but mean that if it came to the bitter bite of iron, the time for words might go by.'

'Ay,' he replied thoughtfully, 'there is some sense in that, but give not up the judicious words too early.'

So we betook ourselves gravely and staidly out of the wood, and at bidding him farewell I received his benediction, which he gave me with his right hand stretched out. And though I am tall and stand as erect as any man, yet the Minister of Edinburgh overtowered me by half a foot. But I minded that not in him.

So I went to the castle armoury to bethink me, for after what I had heard maids and bonnet strings were not to be more in my thought that day.

*CHAPTER XVII*

*THE CORBIES AT THE EAGLE'S NEST*

One snowy day, I mind it was a Thursday according to the day of the week, I had ridden to Girvan by the shore road. I journeyed unmolested save that one sent a shot after me as I passed the tower of Girvanmains. But this not so much, I think, with intent to do me an injury, as because they saw my Cassillis colours, and could not let them pass unchallenged by a yett of the Bargany folk.

But upon my return I got one of the greatest surprises of my life, for as I rode gladly into the courtyard of Culzean, lo! there was my lord out on the steps, with the noble courtesy and distinction which none could assume so well as he, being indeed natural to him, bidding farewell to a pair of guests whom I never looked to see in the courtyard of Culzean, save as it might be coming in decently, heels first, for the purposes of Christian burial.

The two strangers were John Mure of Auchendrayne and the young Laird, his son. The old man was dressed as I first saw him--in plain, fine cloth of blue without decoration. He wore no arms or any armour that was visible--though by the square setting of his body as he came down the steps I judged that he wore a stand of chain mail underneath. His son James, a cruel, loutish, hot-headed, but not wholly ill-looking young man, was clad in the gayest fashion. He wore the wide, falling lace collar which Prince Henry had brought in from France, and a pointed doublet and wide breeches of the newest English mode.

It was John Mure who was speaking, for his son was but a lout, and had little to say all the days of him. He waved his hand to the steps, by the door of Culzean, whereon there stood Marjorie Kennedy, with her arm on Nell's shoulder, both being pale as death, and seeming more dowie and sad than I had ever seen them look before.

'It is to be the burying of strife,' cried Auchendrayne; 'in this loving cup I drink it. The day of our love is at the dawning, and the auguries of the time to come are of the happiest. To our next and sweeter merrymaking!'

And Sir Thomas, with his face one beaming smile of pleasure, bade him a loving farewell, and told him to haste back, for that cousins thus joined in affection could not be too often together.

And all the while I sat Dom Nicholas as one that is sunk fathoms deep in blank astonishment.

As Auchendrayne rode through the gateway, he waved his hand to me, and turning to Culzean, where he stood looking after them, he cried in the hearing of them all,--

'You have there the handsomest and the boldest squire in all the south country, Culzean. This is the bruit that I hear of this young man everywhere I go.'

And so, still smiling and bowing, he rode away with his son half a length of his horse behind him.

But I gave him no greeting, neither yea nor nay--but regarded him with a fixed countenance. For my heart was like stone within me, because of the sorrow that I saw coming on the house and could noways prevent.

Now the bitterness of this winter did not come till some time after the New Year. It was about the midst of January when the frost bit most keenly, and the snow began to fall most deeply. The Culzean lads, James, Alexander and little David (who was my favourite), caused the court and out-buildings to ring with happiness. Joy and peace seemed indeed for a little to have come back to Culzean. This was the first snow since David had donned the trunks, and laid by the bairn's kilts--which are indeed mortally cold wear in the winter season when it comes to rolling in the snow.

David, as I say, was my favourite, and continually in my loneliness a comfort to me, though I have not hitherto often mentioned him, seeing that the young lads of Culzean come not into my tale greatly, saving at this time. Though, in the coming day, they may into the tales others shall tell, when we that now prank it so gaily are no better than the broken shards of a drained pottle-pot. But little Davie was a merry lad, and I am glad that there is occasion for me to name him in this history.

Davie was now manfully equipped in doublet and trunk hosen of duffle grey homespun, so thick that his brothers feigned that with a little trouble and propping they stood up very well by themselves, when their daily tenant had untrussed him and gone to bed.

And ever the snow came down. It lay deep on all the face of the country, but more especially it had swirled into the courtyard of Culzean, so that the very steps of the door were sleeked, and great wreaths lay every way about the court. The lads made revel in it, borrowing shovels from the stables and throwing up the snow on either side, so as to make narrow passages between the different doors of the castle and the offices about.

I cannot set down, because that there is press of matters more serious yet to be related, a tithe of the merry pranks the rogues wrought in their madness. They revelled in the smother of the snow like whelps that are turned loose. Yet because there is none too much of merriment in this chronicle, I shall make shift to tell somewhat of their quipsome rascaldom.

It chanced one morning that Alexander, who was of a mirthful mind, stood by a little door which led into the house wherein our peats and turfs were kept for the fires, so that it might not be necessary to bring a supply each day from the peatstacks on the hill where the greater store was.

Whether Sandy's head ached from having eaten too many cakes at the time of the New Year, I know not, but suddenly it came into his mind that it might be a desirable thing and a cooling, to stick his bullet head into a mighty snowdrift which lay in front of the peat-house door. So accordingly, for no particular reason, he bent himself into an arch and thrust his head neck-deep into the snow.

At this moment came his elder brother, James Kennedy, upon the scene, and his mood was also merry.

'Bless the rascal,' quoth he, 'whither hath his tidy lump of a top-knot betaken itself to?'

So without loss of a moment the rogue made him a large ball of snow, well compacted, and caused it to burst upon the stretched trusses of Sandy's breeches, with a noise like the breaking of an egg upon a wall.