A Double Exposure
Whether the Kelpie had recognized us I could not tell, but not much of
the next morning passed before my doubt was over. When she had set our
porridge on the table, she stood up, and, with her fists in her sides,
addressed my father:
“I’m very sorry, sir, to have to make complaints. It’s a thing I don’t
like, and I’m not given to. I’m sure I try to do my duty by Master
Ranald as well as everyone else in this house.”
I felt a little confused, for I now saw clearly enough that my father
could not approve of our proceedings. I whispered to Allister--
“Run and fetch Turkey. Tell him to come directly.”
Allister always did whatever I asked him. He set off at once. The
Kelpie looked suspicious as he left the room, but she had no pretext
for interference. I allowed her to tell her tale without interruption.
After relating exactly how we had served her the night before, when
she had gone on a visit of mercy, as she represented it, she accused
me of all my former tricks--that of the cat having, I presume,
enlightened her as to the others; and ended by saying that if she were
not protected against me and Turkey, she must leave the place.
“Let her go, father,” I said. “None of us like her.”
“I like her,” whimpered little Davie.
“Silence, sir!” said my father, very sternly. “Are these things true?”
“Yes, father,” I answered. “But please hear what _I_‘ve got to say.
She’s only told you _her_ side of it.”
“You have confessed to the truth of what she alleges,” said my
father. “I did think,” he went on, more in sorrow than in anger,
though a good deal in both, “that you had turned from your bad
ways. To think of my taking you with me to the death-bed of a holy
man, and then finding you so soon after playing such tricks!--more
like the mischievousness of a monkey than of a human being!”
“I don’t say it was right, father; and I’m very sorry if I have
offended you.”
“You _have_ offended me, and very deeply. You have been unkind and
indeed cruel to a good woman who has done her best for you for many
years!”
I was not too much abashed to take notice that the Kelpie bridled at
this.
“I can’t say I’m sorry for what I’ve done to her,” I said.
“Really, Ranald, you are impertinent. I would send you out of the room
at once, but you must beg Mrs. Mitchell’s pardon first, and after that
there will be something more to say, I fear.”
“But, father, you have not heard my story yet.”
“Well--go on. It is fair, I suppose, to hear both sides. But nothing
can justify such conduct.”
I began with trembling voice. I had gone over in my mind the night
before all I would say, knowing it better to tell the tale from the
beginning circumstantially. Before I had ended, Turkey made his
appearance, ushered in by Allister. Both were out of breath with
running.
My father stopped me, and ordered Turkey away until I should have
finished. I ventured to look up at the Kelpie once or twice. She had
grown white, and grew whiter. When Turkey left the room, she would
have gone too. But my father told her she must stay and hear me to the
end. Several times she broke out, accusing me of telling a pack of
wicked lies, but my father told her she should have an opportunity of
defending herself, and she must not interrupt me. When I had done, he
called Turkey, and made him tell the story. I need hardly say that,
although he questioned us closely, he found no discrepancy between our
accounts. He turned at last to Mrs. Mitchell, who, but for her rage,
would have been in an abject condition.
“Now, Mrs. Mitchell!” he said.
She had nothing to reply beyond asserting that Turkey and I had always
hated and persecuted her, and had now told a pack of lies which we had
agreed upon, to ruin her, a poor lone woman, with no friends to take
her part.
“I do not think it likely they could be so wicked,” said my father.
“So I’m to be the only wicked person in the world! Very well, sir! I
will leave the house this very day.”
“No, no, Mrs. Mitchell; that won’t do. One party or the other _is_
very wicked--that is clear; and it is of the greatest consequence to
me to find out which. If you go, I shall know it is you, and have you
taken up and tried for stealing. Meantime I shall go the round of the
parish. I do not think all the poor people will have combined to lie
against you.”
“They all hate me,” said the Kelpie.
“And why?” asked my father.
She made no answer.
“I must get at the truth of it,” said my father. “You can go now.”
She left the room without another word, and my father turned to
Turkey.
“I am surprised at you, Turkey, lending yourself to such silly
pranks. Why did you not come and tell me.”
“I am very sorry, sir. I was afraid you would be troubled at finding
how wicked she was, and I thought we might frighten her away somehow.
But Ranald began his tricks without letting me know, and then I saw
that mine could be of no use, for she would suspect them after his.
Mine would have been better, sir.”
“I have no doubt of it, but equally unjustifiable. And you as well as
he acted the part of a four-footed animal last night.”
“I confess I yielded to temptation then, for I knew it could do no
good. It was all for the pleasure of frightening her. It was very
foolish of me, and I beg your pardon, sir.”
“Well, Turkey, I confess you have vexed me, not by trying to find out
the wrong she was doing me and the whole parish, but by taking the
whole thing into your own hands. It is worse of you, inasmuch as you
are older and far wiser than Ranald. It is worse of Ranald because I
was his father. I will try to show you the wrong you have done.--Had
you told me without doing anything yourselves, then I might have
succeeded in bringing Mrs. Mitchell to repentance. I could have
reasoned with her on the matter, and shown her that she was not merely
a thief, but a thief of the worst kind, a Judas who robbed the poor,
and so robbed God. I could have shown her how cruel she was--”
“Please, sir,” interrupted Turkey, “I don’t think after all she did it
for herself. I do believe,” he went on, and my father listened, “that
Wandering Willie is some relation of hers. He is the only poor person,
almost the only person except Davie, I ever saw her behave kindly to.
He was there last night, and also, I fancy, that other time, when
Ranald got such a fright. She has poor relations somewhere, and sends
the meal to them by Willie. You remember, sir, there were no old
clothes of Allister’s to be found when you wanted them for Jamie
Duff.”
“You may be right, Turkey--I dare say you are right. I hope you are,
for though bad enough, that would not be quite so bad as doing it for
herself.”
“I am very sorry, father,” I said; “I beg your pardon.”
“I hope it will be a lesson to you, my boy. After what you have done,
rousing every bad and angry passion in her, I fear it will be of no
use to try to make her be sorry and repent. It is to her, not to me,
you have done the wrong. I have nothing to complain of for
myself--quite the contrary. But it is a very dreadful thing to throw
difficulties in the way of repentance and turning from evil works.”
“What can I do to make up for it?” I sobbed.
“I don’t see at this moment what you can do. I will turn it over in my
mind. You may go now.”
Thereupon Turkey and I walked away, I to school, he to his cattle. The
lecture my father had given us was not to be forgotten. Turkey looked
sad, and I felt subdued and concerned.
Everything my father heard confirmed the tale we had told him. But the
Kelpie frustrated whatever he may have resolved upon with regard to
her: before he returned she had disappeared. How she managed to get
her chest away, I cannot tell. I think she must have hid it in some
outhouse, and fetched it the next night. Many little things were
missed from the house afterwards, but nothing of great value, and
neither she nor Wandering Willie ever appeared again. We were all
satisfied that poor old Betty knew nothing of her conduct. It was easy
enough to deceive her, for she was alone in her cottage, only waited
upon by a neighbour who visited her at certain times of the day.
My father, I heard afterwards, gave five shillings out of his own
pocket to every one of the poor people whom the Kelpie had defrauded.
Her place in the house was, to our endless happiness, taken by Kirsty,
and faithfully she carried out my father’s instructions that, along
with the sacred handful of meal, a penny should be given to every one
of the parish poor from that time forward, so long as he lived at the
manse.
Not even little Davie cried when he found that Mrs. Mitchell was
really gone. It was more his own affection than her kindness that had
attached him to her.
Thus were we at last delivered from our Kelpie.