As soon as this part of the tale was finished, the
audience showed much greater eagerness to enter
immediately upon the acting of Donald Bean Lean's
cattle-raid, and its consequences, than it had
previously displayed as to the doings of Edward
Waverley.
As Hugh John admitted, this was "something like!"
The Abbey precincts were instantly filled with the
mingled sounds characteristic of all well-conducted
forays, and it was well indeed that the place was
wholly deserted. For the lowings of the driven
cattle, the shouts of the triumphant Highlanders,
the deep rage of the Baron, stalking to and fro
wrapped in his cloak on the Castle terrace, might
well have astonished the crowd which in these
summer days comes from the four corners of the
world "to view fair Melrose aright."
It was not till the edge had worn off their first
enthusiasm, that it became possible to collect them
again in order to read "The Hold of a Highland
Robber," which makes Chapter Seventeenth of
_Waverley_ itself. And the reading so fired the
enthusiasm of Sweetheart that she asked for the
book to take to bed with her. The boys were more
practical, though equally enthusiastic.
"Wait till we get home," cried Hugh John, cracking
his fingers and thumbs. "I know a proper place for
Donald Bean Lean's cave."
"And I," said Sir Toady Lion, "will light a fire by
the pond and toss the embers into the water. It
will be jolly to hear 'em hiss, I tell you!"
"But what," asked Maid Margaret, "shall we do for
the cattle and sheep that were hanging by the
heels, when Edward went into Donald Bean Lean's
cave?"
"Why, we will hang _you_ up by the heels and cut
slices off you!" said Sir Toady, with frowning
truculence.
Whereat the little girl, a little solemnised, began
to edge away from the dangerous neighbourhood of
such a pair of young cannibals. Sweetheart
reproached her brothers for inventing calumnies
against their countrymen.
"Even the Highlanders were never so wicked," she
objected; "they did not eat one another."
"Well, anyway," retorted Sir Toady Lion, unabashed,
"Sawney Bean did. Perhaps he was a cousin of
Donald's, though in the history it says that he
came from East Lothian."
"Yes," cried Hugh John, "and in an old book written
in Latin it says (father read it to us) that one of
his little girls was too young to be executed with
the rest on the sands of Leith. So the King sent
her to be brought up by kind people, where she was
brought up without knowing anything of her father,
the cannibal, and her mother, the cannibaless--"
"Oh," cried Sweetheart, who knew what was coming,
putting up her hands over her ears, "please don't
tell that dreadful story all over again."
"Father read it out of a book--so there!" cried Sir
Toady, implacably, "go on, Hugh John!"
"And so when this girl was about as big as
Sweetheart, and, of course, could not remember her
grandfather's nice cave or the larder where the
arms and legs were hung up to dry in the smoke--"
"Oh, you horrid boy!" cried Sweetheart, not,
however, removing herself out of ear-shot--because,
after all, it was nice to shiver just a little.
"Oh, yes, and I have seen the cave," cried Sir
Toady, "it is on the shore near Ballantrae--a
horrid place. Go on, Hugh John, tell about Sawney
Bean's grandchild!"
"Well, she grew up and up, playing with dolls just
like other girls, till she was old enough to be
sent out to service. And after she had been a while
about the house to which she went, it was noticed
that some of the babies in the neighbourhood began
to go a-missing, and they found--"
"I think she was a nursemaid!" interrupted Sir
Toady, dispassionately. "That must have been it.
The little wretches cried--_so she ate them!_"
"Oh," cried Sweetheart, stopping her ears with her
fingers, "don't tell us what they found--I believe
you made it all up, anyway."
"No, I didn't," cried Hugh John, shouting in her
ear as if to a very deaf person, "it was father who
read it to us, out of a big book with fat black
letters. So it must be true!"
Sir Toady was trying to drag away his sister's arms
that she might have the benefit of details, when I
appeared in the distance. Whereupon Hugh John, who
felt his time growing limited, concluded thus, "And
when they were taking the girl away to hang her,
the minister asked her why she had killed the
babies, and she answered him, 'If people only knew
how good babies were--especially little
girls--_there would not be one left between Forth
and Solway!_'"
Then quite unexpectedly Maid Margaret began to sob
bitterly.
"They _shan't_ hang me up and eat me," she cried,
running as hard as she could and flinging herself
into my arms; "Hugh John and Sir Toady say they
will, as soon as we get home."
Happily I had a light cane of a good vintage in my
hand, and it did not take long to convince the pair
of young scamps of the inconvenience of frightening
their little sister. Sweetheart looked on
approvingly as two forlorn young men were walked
off to a supper, healthfully composed of plain
bread and butter, and washed down by some nice cool
water from the pump.
"I told you!" she said, "you wouldn't believe me."
All the same she was tender-hearted enough to
convey a platter of broken meats secretly up to
their "condemned cell," as I knew from finding the
empty plate under their washstand in the morning.
And as Maid Margaret was being carried off to be
bathed and comforted, a Voice, passing their door,
threatened additional pains and penalties to little
boys who frightened their sisters.
"It was all in a book," said Hugh John, defending
himself from under the bedclothes, "father read it
to us!"
"We did it for her good," suggested Sir Toady.
"If I hear another word out of you--" broke in the
Voice; and then added, "go to sleep this instant!"
The incident of the cave had long been forgotten
and forgiven, before I could continue the story of
Waverley in the cave of Donald Bean Lean. We sat
once more "in oor ain hoose at hame," or rather
outside it, near a certain pleasant chalet in a
wood, from which place you can see a brown and
turbulent river running downward to the sea.